labour Jobs target ‘far out of reach’

South Africa aims at creating 5 million jobs by 2020 but has only created 624 000 in the past decade. This was revealed yesterday in a survey to be released by the SA Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR) this week. The data, which is sourced from Statistics SA, shows that total employment has increased by an average of only 0.5 percent a year since 2001. SAIRR researcher Lucy Holborn said the rate of job creation would need to rise nearly 10 times to meet the government’s targets. She said the data showed how difficult it would be to meet the 2020 target, given the trend over the past decade. South Africa’s official unemployment rate was 25 percent in the third quarter of 2011. – Sapa Source