By Frieda Nangolo
Imagine spending years preparing yourself for the world of work. You study, graduate, prepare your CV, send out applications and wait for the opportunity that will finally allow you to begin building your life.
But the opportunity does not come. The bills, however, do. Transport still costs money, food still needs to be bought, families still need support, and life does not pause simply because employment has not arrived.
So, what do you do when the job you prepared for is simply not available?
I have been thinking about this question differently lately, particularly when looking at the number of young people finding ways to earn an income outside formal employment.
Some sell food or clothes. Others braid hair, bake, repair phones, design posters, photograph events, do nails or turn whatever skill they have into something that can generate an income.
We place all these activities under the broad label of the informal economy, but I think that term sometimes prevents us from seeing the individual stories behind it.
Behind every small business is a person, and behind that person is a reason for starting. For some, it is survival. For others, it is opportunity. For many, it may be both.
We often speak about entrepreneurship as though it always begins with a brilliant idea, a carefully written business plan and a lifelong dream of owning a business.
But sometimes entrepreneurship begins because somebody needs money for transport next week. Sometimes it begins because another job application has gone unanswered. Sometimes it begins because sitting at home waiting for employment is no longer financially possible.
Research on unemployed young Namibians has shown how young people develop different survival strategies when employment and stable income are unavailable.
Research into Windhoek’s informal food sector has similarly demonstrated that limited livelihood opportunities can influence people’s participation in informal economic activities.
This is why I believe we need to be more careful about how we interpret youth entrepreneurship. Not every young person selling something on the side necessarily started because they dreamed of becoming an entrepreneur. Sometimes people create work because they cannot find work.
A young person selling food from home may simply be trying to make enough money to get through the month.
Yet somewhere between buying ingredients, calculating costs, setting prices, attracting customers and convincing those customers to return, that young person is also learning how to run a business. Survival may unexpectedly become their first lesson in entrepreneurship.
At the same time, I do not think it would be fair to describe every young person in the informal economy as someone desperately waiting to be rescued by formal employment.
There are young people who genuinely see self-employment as an opportunity. One of the attractions of informal economic activity is that, depending on the type of business, a person may be able to start with the skills and resources already available to them.
There is no interview panel deciding whether you are qualified enough to sell your product. There is no rejection email informing you that another candidate had more experience. Sometimes you simply identify a need, find customers and start.
Of course, being able to start does not mean it is easy to succeed. Informal businesses can face unstable income, limited access to finance, inadequate resources and difficulty expanding beyond survival level.
We should therefore be careful not to romanticise informal work simply because it demonstrates resilience.
There is nothing glamorous about being forced to create an income because you have no other option. At the same time, we should not dismiss the potential that exists within these activities.
A young person operating a small business today may be doing much more than surviving. They may be building tomorrow’s enterprise.
Perhaps the simplest way I have come to understand this is through two forces: what pushes young people into the informal economy and what pulls them towards it. Limited formal employment opportunities, difficulties entering the labour market and financial pressure can push a young person towards informal work.
On the other hand, accessibility, independence and entrepreneurial opportunity can pull them towards it. The interesting part is that real life does not always separate these two forces neatly.
Someone may begin selling lunch because they desperately need an income. Months later, customers are returning and orders are increasing.
Eventually, another person may be brought in to help. What began as a survival strategy is slowly becoming a business opportunity.
At what point do we stop seeing that young person simply as unemployed and begin recognising them as an entrepreneur? I think this is part of the conversation Namibia needs to have.
However, there is another side to this conversation that concerns me. When youth unemployment is high, it becomes very easy to tell young people to simply “start businesses” or “create jobs instead of looking for jobs”.
It sounds empowering, but it can also shift responsibility for a much larger economic problem onto individuals. Entrepreneurship should be an opportunity, not an excuse for an economy that cannot generate enough decent employment.
Not everyone wants to become an entrepreneur, and not everyone has the resources, skills or circumstances required to build a successful business.
A young person should not be made to feel that unemployment is a personal failure simply because they have not managed to create a company for themselves.
Namibia still needs decent formal employment opportunities. But I also believe we need to become better at recognising what young people are already creating outside formal employment.
If a young person has already found a way to generate an income, perhaps our question should not always be how quickly we can move them into a formal job.
Sometimes the better question might be: what would it take to help what they have already created become sustainable?
Imagine what could happen if a young street vendor received practical financial-management training. What could a talented young baker build with affordable equipment and access to finance?
What could happen if someone running a small service business from home received mentorship, digital skills and access to a larger market?
How many promising young businesses disappear before we ever recognise their potential because the person behind them simply did not have the capital, knowledge or support required to move beyond survival?
For me, this is where Namibia’s response needs to become more balanced. We absolutely need formal job creation, but we also need stronger pathways for skills development, access to finance, mentorship and practical business support for young people who are already creating livelihoods for themselves. Supporting informal enterprise should not replace the responsibility to create decent jobs. The two should exist alongside each other.
The informal economy should therefore not only be viewed as evidence of unemployment. It is also evidence of what people do when conventional opportunities are unavailable.
There is resilience there. There is creativity there. There is entrepreneurship there. But there is vulnerability too, and we should never confuse resilience with the absence of struggle.
Perhaps this is also something we need to consider when we talk about the future of work in Namibia.
The future of work may not exist only inside offices, factories, mines and established organisations. Part of it may already be taking shape at market stalls, inside home kitchens, behind laptops and through small businesses that have never appeared on an organisational chart.
Some of these businesses may not have begun with investors, offices or carefully prepared business plans. Some may simply have begun with somebody asking themselves, “How am I going to survive this month?”
And that is why I think our conversation about youth unemployment needs to go beyond asking, “Where will we find jobs for our young people?”
We should also be asking:
“How do we help the work they are already creating become sustainable?”
Because for some young Namibians, today’s survival strategy may just be tomorrow’s business.
