Thousands benefit from City’s youth initiatives
22 February 2016
Thousands of young people are benefiting from the City of Johannesburg’s youth empowerment and upskilling initiatives being championed by Executive Mayor Councillor Parks Tau.
More than 19 000 youths are already active under Vulindlel’ eJozi, a programme announced by the Mayor in his State of the City Address (SOCA) in May 2015.
Officially launched on 16 June 2015 to coincide with the 39th anniversary of the Soweto students uprising, Vulindlel’ eJozi seeks to create opportunities for economically disengaged youths by removing barriers hindering them from entering the jobs market.
The programme channels registered youths into five opportunity streams: formal employment, micro-enterprise/micro-franchise, formal training towards identified employment channels, work experience placements, and baseline literacy and numeracy upgrades.
Since its launch, the R150-million initiative, a partnership between the City and Harambee Youth Accelerator, has identified more than 45 000 skills training, employment and internship opportunities, from which 19 117 candidates have already benefited.
To date the programme has more than 100 000 registered candidates. It aims to achieve its target of 200 000 candidates by July 2016.
“We’re a city where the young lead the call for transformation, demanding the opportunity to work, to improve their lives and become the best they can be. A city that knows that with just a little help, our youth are not the challenge some think them to be but our greatest asset,” says Mayor Tau.
Jak Koseff, Special Adviser on Priority Projects in the Executive Mayor’s Office, says Vulindlel’ eJozi will step up and intensify its corporate mobilisation drive, upscale basic skills upgrades and expand its enterprise development offering.
Linked to Vulindlel’ eJozi are the Jozi Digital Ambassadors and Massive Open Online Varsity (MOOV) Network programmes. The two initiatives see Vulindlel’ eJozi candidates channelled into these employment or upskilling and training opportunities.
Koseff says the R80-million Jozi Digital Ambassadors programme aims to foster and improve basic digital literacy and online mobile literacy in communities and promote the City’s free Wi-Fi and upskilling programme for up-and-coming digi-enterprises.
Driven in partnership with the University of Johannesburg, the programme in its pilot phase empowered 85 digital ambassadors in Orlando, Soweto, hotpots where they have interacted and assisted 9 349 households. The programme’s aim is to deploy 3 000 digital ambassadors to activate 750 000 Johannesburg homes.
“The micro-companies that have been established as a result have achieved a combined turnover of R467 450 from activations,” says Koseff, adding that the programme will be expanded to other areas as more Wi-Fi hotspots are established.
The MOOV network programme has enabled access to 11 video-enabled digital learning sites throughout the City’s attached libraries, including Orange Farm, which has more than 900 students already signed on for various courses and curricula, Alexandra, Johannesburg Central and Westbury. More centres – including Jabavu, Emdeni, Eldorado Park, Ivory Park, Diepsloot and Bramfischerville – will be opened later this year.
“A total of 2 400 candidates are currently registered on Vulindlel’ eJozi and using the MOOV system ... We encourage businesses to interact with the programme to build opportunity channels into their operations,” Koseff concludes.