Create opportunities for economic participation.

A survey in Tsantsabane Local Municipality, one of the main municipalities within Lesedi Trust’s catchment, found that 79% of young people in the municipality were unemployed. Most of the employed people worked in the mining industry, with the next two top employers being local retailers and the public sector. As a result of the high unemployment rate among youth, most have no income at all, or earn less than R1 000 per month. Even employed youth earn low salaries, averaging R5 000 per month or less.

This dynamic is not unique to this municipality. In fact, all the communities within both the Lesedi and Letsatsi catchment areas have relatively low economic activity and high unemployment rates. This highlights the need for our strategy to work at expanding local job opportunities.

It is worth exploring a number of untapped opportunities to stimulate labourabsorptive economic activity in these areas. In South Africa, one of the untapped opportunities is the so-called “township economy”. Another opportunity is the small, micro and medium enterprises (SMME) sector, which is believed to be contributing to 80% of all new job opportunities. Experts estimate that the hemp and cannabis industry could create as many as 130 000 jobs. 33 five-year aim:

In addition to this, the programmatic investments made by the Trusts provide an opportunity to inject and circulate new flows of funding in these local communities. With some intentionality and strategic thinking, the Trusts’ funding presents an opportunity to create jobs and stimulate new economic activity.

› Create access to new job opportunities and optimise our investment injection as an economic stimulant and job creator.