Namibia is amongst the top 20 countries in the world, with the highest unemployment rate, of which 20.59% of them are youth. This rate keeps growing day by day as it gets harder to secure jobs even after completing university. Offering skills to positively impact youth and helping them come up with businesses or growing the one they already had established is one of the key aspects at heart for RLabs Namibia.
Over a month ago, we shared a survey with youth in our database from the year 2012-2021, to find out how they are coping with their businesses and the areas they would love to develop in.
The survey was sent out to about 72 respondents and a total of 43 responses was received. Out of the 43 responses, 36 of them are business owners, the youngest business is 2 months and the oldest has been in existence for 10 years. However not all these businesses are registered. The types of businesses vary from agricultural farming, nail technician, bar/pub owners, catering, business consultants, electrician, just to touch on a few.
The survey was completed by youth from all over Namibia and the majority are interested in growing their businesses in different ways such as:
- Register the business and get funds to expand
- Buy machinery to upgrade the business
- Create jobs and increase profit margin
- Upgrade skills with new technology
- Open other branches across the country
- Get a bigger working space
In conclusion, this is a quote from one of the students who completed one of our courses
During this pandemic, I have learned that tough times don’t last forever, but tough people do”- Immanuela Jossob, these are some of the wise words that kept her going when COVID started and how she managed to grow her business to a different level.
