South Africa’s history of apartheid and marginalization has made it rife with poverty. A report published by the World Bank in 2023 concluded that as of 2014, an estimated 55% of South Africans lived at and under the national poverty line. According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), 50% of people aged 25 to 34 do not have the upper secondary qualifications needed to sustain a healthy labor force. This data points to a massive educational issue, and fixing that starts with school reform and youth preparedness. Here is how people are working on enriching young lives in South Africa.

Accenture

In early September 2023, there was an announcement that Accenture, an IT service company, provided a grant worth R24 million in South Africa’s currency ($1.3 million) to Save the Children: South Africa. STC will receive funding for youth entrepreneurship and local community projects for the next three years. Accenture has a program known as Skills 2 Succeed, where it invests in foreign countries targeting unprivileged youths. The target is an estimated 30,000 youths of equal boys and girls aged 15-24 from the most impoverished parts of the country.

Accenture will provide training for skills development while promoting climate change and the green economic sector. About 860 adults will be directed on how to create more fruitful environments as the basis for enriching young lives in South Africa. This direction includes implementing more modern technology to develop digital skills. Accenture is partnering with local community service organizations to provide computers and other digital equipment to prepare the youth for the modern world.

Shoprite Holdings

Shoprite Holdings is the largest supermarket company in Africa. In the past five years, the company has given opportunities to local communities with the Youth Employment Service (YES) Program. So far, at least 9,454 opportunities have been created for South African youth.

Participants receive a year of retail training and experience; afterward, they can begin working in retail, explore other sectors with newfound skills or choose the path of entrepreneurship. Shoprite also has a personal seven-week Retail Readiness Program, which teaches basic retail and management skills to unemployed youth. It is the largest and most successful skills development program by a South African retailer. Over the past three years, Shoprite has invested more than R384.5 million ($20.66 million) into developing 18,513 unemployed youth.

According to the Shoprite Group’s 2023 Food Index, 21.18% of South African children will experience stunting by 2025. Children affected by stunting (while being more likely to be victims of poverty in adolescence) are more likely to drop out of school and remain impoverished into and throughout adulthood.

Shoprite is partnering to support 479 children enrolled at 10 Early Childhood Development (ECD) education centers in Soweto. ECD centers provide a safe and instructional location to teach young children and provide a solid foundation for their future. However, many of these centers struggle to support themselves. Since last year, Shoprite has served more than 7,200 meals daily to children at over 114 ECD centers across South Africa.

Afrika Tikkun Bambanani

Afrika Tikkun Bambanani is dedicated to maximizing ECD and supporting impoverished youth. The company recently launched its Bamba Learn app, which is available on Android and iOS. It is an educational app that plans to teach fundamental skills such as numeracy, literacy and critical thinking to children aged two to six.

An estimated 800 employees are working on enriching young lives in South Africa, with 200 early learning centers in disadvantaged communities throughout the country serving as the cognitive foundation of 10,000 of South Africa’s future.

Sun International

Another group working hard to instill quality education in children in South Africa is Sun International, a development and investing company. Literacy is a fundamental part of education, and according to the 2030 Reading Panel report for 2023, South Africa has experienced a significant regression in children’s literacy; most children graduate grade one without knowing the alphabet and a recently estimated 82% of grade four students struggle to read for understanding. 

This regression has severe indications for stunted critical thinking skills on a generational scale. The greatest issue is that children are simply not reading due to lack of access. 

Sun International worked with the local nonprofit Read To Rise in September to counteract this crisis by donating books and school supplies to Vukani Primary School in Soweto. The donation included four mini-libraries, school supplies for grades three and four students and 65 additional books for the school with a total value of R37,500 ($2,000). Over seven years, Sun International has worked to send 13,000 books to 23 primary schools across South Africa and into the hands of an estimated 6,241 young minds.

Looking Forward

On the bright side, various initiatives and corporations are actively working to uplift young lives and combat the educational challenges stemming from historical issues in South Africa. Accenture’s investment in youth entrepreneurship and digital skills, Shoprite’s Youth Employment Service Program, Afrika Tikkun Bambanani’s innovative Bamba Learn app and Sun International’s efforts to promote literacy all contribute to creating a brighter future for South African youth. These endeavors demonstrate a commitment to breaking the cycle of poverty by investing in education and skill development, paving the way for positive change.

–Eddie Dale

Photo: Flickr