More Africans joining self-employment, says labour report

Sep 24, 2017

According to the 2017 report released by International Labour Organisation, about four out of five young working people are self-employed in Sub-Saharan Africa

Many young Africans no longer wait for salaried jobs after university

Self-employment has become the dominant employment form in the Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and it is limited in the eastern Europe and central Asia (EECA) and in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).

According to the 2017 report released by the International Labour Organisation, about four out of five young working people are self-employed in SSA, while the corresponding proportion in EECA and MENA is only about one in five.

The report titled "Rising to the youth employment challenge" also highlights that when asked why they were self-employed rather than waged or salaried employees, the most common answer for both self-employed and employers was "to gain greater independence". 43% of employers gave this reason, as did 37 % of the self-employed.

Not being able to find salaried jobs was given as the main reason for 29% of self-employed and 19 % of employers

The dominant self-employment for instance in Uganda can be explained by the fact that Uganda, which is one of the countries in SSA was in 2015 ranked the most entrepreneurial country in the world.

With an entrepreneurship rate of 28%, Uganda was in in the best place with almost double the entrepreneurship rate of Thailand, who came in second place with 16%.

The research which was carried out by Approved Index, pointed at, several reasons behind Uganda's entrepreneurial title; its violent past. The survey revealed that the Idi Amin's reign of terror left the country in physical and economic turmoil, but with fast population growth.

It revealed that there is the entrepreneurial spirit and in street markets and small establishments where people are involved in selling of food, to trinkets, to cobblers, honey makers and hand crafted furniture among other things.

Meanwhile the report also indicates that in the recent years, supporting the growth of self-employment and entrepreneurship has become a key element of ILO's proposed strategies for promoting youth employment, particularly in lower-income countries.

It also suggested subsidy wages for youth although it is only South Africa that has the programme in the entire Sub-Saharan Africa.

The report also reveals that subsidy programmes for youth have reduced the problem of extremely high youth unemployment rates, especially among black Africans where in 2012, close to two-thirds of non-white South Africans aged 20-24 were unemployed.

 

 

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