By Tshego Bokaba, CSI Manager at Momentum Group Foundation
The Momentum Group Foundation exists to create genuine, lasting economic opportunities for young South Africans. Where we invest, in what, and why are questions we return to constantly. So when the recent On the Record conference brought together economists, policymakers and business leaders to ask how South Africa can create 5 million formal jobs in the next 10 years, it felt directly relevant to the work we do every day.
The speakers included Dr Keyu Jin, an expert on macroeconomic dynamics and author of The New China Playbook, Irish economist and writer David McWilliams, and Indian economist and former director of the Independent Evaluation Office at the IMF, Montek Ahluwalia on India. President Ramaphosa also addressed the conference.
China and India commanded the room for good reason. China has lifted more than 800 million people out of extreme poverty since the late 1970s, while India has seen GDP per capita rise roughly tenfold over the past three decades, making it the fastest-growing major economy in the world. These two powerhouses took very different roads to economic transformation but what they shared was something fundamental: clarity about where to focus, aligning skills to real economic demand, and a strong government-private sector relationship.
South Africa cannot copy either model wholesale, but we can learn from the principles behind them and ask honestly whether we are applying them. Those are exactly the questions the Foundation tries to answer every day.
Focus on the sectors that create real jobs
China built its economic miracle on manufacturing. India built its on services, particularly IT, business process outsourcing (BPO) and financial services. Neither country tried to grow everything at once. They made deliberate choices about where to concentrate energy and investment. In the famous words of Lesetja Kganyago, Governor of the South African Reserve Bank (SARB): “If everything is a priority, nothing is a priority.”
South Africa has its own high-potential sectors. The research, presented at the conference, identified agriculture, manufacturing, construction and mining as having the greatest capacity to generate formal jobs over the next decade. Agriculture alone could create up to 200,000 new jobs, driven primarily by horticulture and agri-processing. Manufacturing, which contributes 13% to GDP and accounts for 42% of our exports, touches almost every other part of the economy.
At the Foundation, our investment decisions are guided by exactly this kind of sector mapping. We invest in agriculture through our Women in Farming initiative. We support young people entering the BPO sector through partners like Harambee and ALX, a sector with a high absorption rate at entry level. We invest in technology skills through WeThinkCode and the Faith Mangope Leadership Academy. These are deliberate choices, made because the data points to opportunity. As we continue refining our mission, we will continue checking that we are investing in the right commodities and the right skills at every turn.
Match skills to the jobs that actually exist
India’s transformation was built on technical education, where a large, young, English-speaking workforce trained in IT and engineering created the foundation for a services-led economy. The skills pipeline and the economic opportunity grew together.
South Africa has not managed to do the same. Youth unemployment sits at close to 60% – and much of that comes down to a gap between what young people are equipped to do and what the economy actually needs. Our education system is not producing the skills that growing sectors are looking for, and that disconnect is costing us jobs we could otherwise be creating.
This is why the Foundation does not simply fund training. We research the sectors and the specific skills within them that employers are looking for today and will need tomorrow, and we align our investment accordingly. The goal is never a certificate. It is a young person who is able to participate fully in the economy and play a proud part in our society.
Build the partnership between government and business that makes it all possible
One of the most consistent threads across the China, India and Ireland case studies is the relationship between the state and the private sector. In China, local government actively backs entrepreneurs and is held accountable for economic outcomes. In India, reducing red tape and opening the economy to trade and foreign investment created the conditions for private enterprise to flourish. President Ramaphosa echoed this at the conference, calling for competent local government and a business environment that actively supports growth.
The Foundation’s role in this ecosystem is to act as a bridge. We are not government, and we are not the private sector in the traditional sense. We sit in the space between them, supporting young people to access opportunities while working with government and business to ensure that investment in skills leads to real employment outcomes. This kind of collaboration only works when everyone show up with genuine commitment.
The Momentum Group Foundation is ready for the challenge.
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