Cape Town - Statistics SA has published its latest Quarterly Labour Force Survey (QLFS) for the first quarter of 2023, showing that the official unemployment rate nationally has risen to 32.9%, a 0.2 percentage point increase from 32.7% in the preceding quarter.
The QLFS also showed that 3.7 million young people, accounting for 36.1% of the 15-24 age group, are not in employment, education, or training.
According to the expanded definition of the unemployment rate, which includes those discouraged from seeking work, and which analysts see as being more reflective of the actual number of unemployed persons in the country, now sits at 42.4%.
Anchor capital Investment analyst Casey Delport said the unemployment rate was “concerningly high”.
However, the data also showed that of the jobs created quarter-on-quarter nationally, 24% were in the Western Cape.
The data showed the expanded unemployment rate in the province was 16.5 percentage points lower than the national rate.
Commenting on the data Premier Alan Winde said: “Despite the good news for the province, the overall picture for South Africa is still very sobering and is worsening.
“The escalation in rolling blackouts and the poor economic climate will hamper any attempts to change the current jobs’ trajectory.”
Meanwhile, in her analysis of the data, Finance and Economic Opportunities MEC Mireille Wenger said that the province created 360 000 more jobs compared to the same quarter in 2022.
Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis said that the City was encouraged by unemployment in Cape Town declining by four percentage points year-on-year, with the city maintaining the lowest unemployment rate of the metros.
The data also showed that the Western Cape created 47 000 jobs in agriculture over the last year, compared to the number of jobs in the sector created nationally, which came to 43 000.
Despite this rise in jobs in the agriculture sector, the South African Veterinary Council (SAVC) has voiced its concerns about the removal of veterinarians from South Africa’s critical skills list last year.
SAVC’s president, Dr Nandipha Ndudane, said: “Alarming recent statistics show high numbers of vets leaving the country.
“This means South Africa faces a severe skills shortage in a profession that is deemed critical to ensuring food safety and security.”
Ndudane said a recent survey by the South African Veterinary Association (Sava) found that a fifth of young vets aged 25 to 29 intended to emigrate
Ndudane said the current situation was raising alarm bells in a country that only has 60 to 70 vets per million citizens, already far below the international norm of 200 to 400 vets per million.
“A shortage can have an adverse effect on the availability and provision of veterinary services, especially to rural communities, with a devastating impact on livestock health and food safety.”
She said to remedy the situation the SAVC was in discussions with the Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development and other stakeholders to urgently add veterinarians back on to the critical skills list when it comes up for review.