81315741-Jobs Boost Process and Value-for-Money Evaluation

In South Africa young people in particular struggle to enter the labour market. In response to this challenge, the President of the Republic of South Africa has established the Presidential Youth Employment Intervention (PYEI), a comprehensive effort to ensure young people are successfully transitioning from learning to earning. The PYEI established a number of funding mechanisms to test and scale approaches to improve access to economic opportunities for young people. One of these funding mechanisms is the Jobs Boost programme. Jobs Boost is a R300 million (~EUR15 million) pay-for-performance model being piloted in South Africa. It is an outcomes fund that works with implementing partners to secure sustainable, quality jobs for unemployed, excluded youth. It is the largest youth employment outcomes fund in the world, and a major innovation in the South African government"s effort to confront the chronic youth unemployment problem. Further information on Jobs Boost is available on this website: https://jobsboost.org.za Jobs Boost was initiated by the Presidency, together with the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) and the National Skills Fund (NSF), as part of the PYEI. It received funding support through the Presidential Employment Stimulus and directly from the NSF. Funding for the design of the programme was provided by the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation. The pilot of the programme was designed and is being managed by Krutham through a non-profit company (NPC), Employment Outcomes NPC, which was established to administer the fund. The implementers were contracted in July 2024. Implementation commenced in August 2024 and will run for 12 months. Measurement of milestone achievement will continue for an additional 6 months beyond the 12 month period. For the pilot, the NSF, a part of the DHET, act as the sole funders, a pioneering role for a public entity. By acting as the funder, the NSF is taking the lead in government grant-making for skills development and is intended to identify new, innovative approaches to funding solutions for youth unemployment.