Community Development (SWK224)

Date: 18 July 2017

Time: 10:45

Venue: Black Aud.

Key Development Challenges in South Africa and Comm. Dev.

South Africa has made considerable strides toward improving

the wellbeing of its citizens since its transition to democracy in
the mid-1990s, but progress is slowing (World Bank, 2017).
Reducing poverty is seen as the world's greatest challenge and
in South Africa it is counted as one of the countrys triple
threats, the other two being unemployment and inequality.
Poverty fell from 33.8% in 1996 to 16.9% by 2008.
Poverty was 16.6% in 2011, but World Bank estimates suggest
poverty barely changed in 2016, dropping just marginally to an
estimated 15.9%.
This is because of safety nets provided by the state in the form
of social security services such as grants, free basic services and
taxes favouring the poor, the poverty rate dropped from 46.2%
to 39%.
However, a study by Wim Pretorius (2016) revealed that about 63% of
young South African children live in poverty, which can affect their
physical, cognitive and emotional development, a new study has found.
The study, which was a joint publication between Ilifa Labantwana, the
Childrens Institute at the University of Cape Town and the Department
 of Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation in the Presidency, was published
in the South African Early Childhood Review.
The study found that about 3 969 000 young South African children live
in poverty, with the Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo having
the highest rates (Nicolson, 2015).
High unemployment remains a key challenge: South Africas
unemployment rate hit a 12-year high in 2016, at 27.3% in the third
quarter (Stats SA, 2017).
The unemployment rate is even higher among youths, close to 50%.
The unemployment rate in South Africa increased to 27.7 percent in the
first quarter of 2017 from 26.5 percent in the previous period.