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Youth Volunteers To Use Technology To Empower SA Communities

Youth Volunteers To Use Technology To Empower SA Communities

To help advance youth economic empowerment, Vodacom has given a facelift to Vodacom Change the World by relaunching the program as an information and communication technology (ICT) and youth volunteerism initiative.

Vodacom Change the World helps create work-experience opportunities for young people, who in turn will use their skills and time to give back to their communities through the non-profit organizations (NPOs) of their choice. The selected candidates are placed at these NPOs for a year across all nine provinces. Each NPO receives a grant and the volunteer a monthly stipend during the partnership.

From Time Live.

On Thursday November 2 at Gallagher Convention Centre in Midrand, 20 young professionals were announced as the 2017 intake. They are excited and looking forward to starting their projects and giving back to South Africa’s communities.

The Vodacom Change the World program was introduced in 2011, giving individuals the opportunity to volunteer their time and skills to work for a NPO for 12 months. To date, 111 volunteers have already made a difference through their placement at a range of NPOs.

Takalani Netshitenzhe, chief officer of corporate affairs at Vodacom Group, said: “Statistics released by Statistics South Africa in August this year indicate that youth unemployment is at its highest since 2003, with more than 50 percent of the youth between the ages of 15 and 24 jobless. In a contracting economy, the prospects of addressing this challenge of unemployment at a faster pace are dim. It is against this background that Vodacom revised the volunteer program in order to contribute to national youth development programs.

Read more at Time Live.