Young people in South Africa face a myriad of challenges, including high unemployment, poverty, education inequality, lack of access to mentorship programmes, and a lack of participation in decision-making processes. The Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund (NMCF) has worked directly with South African youth for more than 20 years through various initiatives, including The Leadership Excellence & Skills Development initiative (2000-2010), Youth for Change (2010-2016), Efeng Bacha (EB) (2002-2021), and Children’s Parliaments (2011-2021). The primary goal of the YLP is to promote youth leadership and entrepreneurship skills, as well as encourage civic participation of South African youth in decision-making processes. This is to be achieved through Efeng Bacha, Legacy Academy, and the Nelson Mandela Children’s Parliament (NMCP). These initiatives are founded upon the belief that if YLP creates platforms for children and youth to develop their skills and engage in advocacy, then this will decrease their vulnerabilities and increase their levels of empowerment.
A graphical summary timeline of the YLP for the years 2011 to 2021 is provided below. For further detail on the history of the programme, refer to the YLP Critical Reflection and Review Document (2022)
The NMCF recognises there are numerous challenges the country and its people are facing. The organisation has identified the following most pressing challenges that it would like to contribute towards addressing.
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The YLP will focus on addressing the above challenges in the following ways:
Conceptual frameworks
NMCF places children at the heart of their focus and recognises the fact that children are located within a family and a community which is fundamental to their health, safety, wellbeing, empowerment, and the provision and promotion of their holistic rights and responsibilities. Bronfenbrenner’s (1986) socio-ecological framework views child development as a complex system of interactions at multiple levels of the surrounding environment (from family, friends, schools, and communities) to broader-level values, economics, laws, and policies. Bronfenbrenner (1986) divided a person’s environment into different systems, including the micro-system, exo-system, and macro-system.
The identified partners will operate in the priority districts outlined below. As illustrated in the map below, a total of 25 priority districts have been identified for the strategic period (2023-2027). A subset of 12 priority districts will be targeted in the first phase (2023) (green pins) and the remaining 13 priority districts will be targeted in the second phase (2025) (red pins). The priority districts specific to YLP for the first strategic period are shown in red text.
