Resource information
Biblio references- an attempt to compile some background information on SLM employment opportunities, can SLM create employment opportunities, examples of SLM jobs created, land and labor nexus, green jobs, youth employment with a focus on SSA, projects with number of jobs created.
DID YOU KNOW:
➢ Roughly 122 million young people will enter the labor force between 2010 and 2020, with slightly more than half of them from rural areas, putting immense pressure on both agriculture and non-farm sectors to generate employment opportunities. However, even under highly favorable conditions, Fine et al. (2012) estimate that non-farm sectors can generate only
• 70 million wage jobs over this same period, mainly in manufacturing, retailing, hospitality, and government. This means that farming will be called upon to provide gainful employment for at least a third of Africa’s young labor force
However, for agriculture to effectively fulfill this mandate, young people growing up in densely populated areas will require access to farm technologies that are radically more productive and profitable, as well as access to new land. Hence, even as Africa becomes progressively urbanized, smallholder agriculture will remain fundamental for absorbing much of Africa’s burgeoning young labor force into gainful employment (Losch, 2012). A related consequence of Africa’s demographic ‘‘youth bulge’’ is that intergenerational subdivision of land will constrain the options of rural youth entering the labor force. Intergenerational and inter-sibling conflicts may intensify further because rural parents in their 50s and 60s may not yet be ready or able to ‘‘retire’’ and bequeath their land assets to their children, or otherwise subdivide their land.
Agricultural and rural development strategies in the region will need to more fully anticipate the implications of Africa’s rapidly changing land and demographic situation, and the immense challenges that mounting land pressures pose in the context of current evidence of unsustainable agricultural intensification, a rapidly rising labor force associated with the region’s current demographic conditions, and limited nonfarm job creation. These challenges are manageable but will require explicit policy actions to address the unique development challenges in densely populated rural areas.
