Nearly half of agriculture graduates unemployed

Agriculture continues to produce the highest proportion of unemployed graduates in Namibia, with nearly half (47%) unable to secure jobs, according to data from the National Council for Higher Education (NCHE).

Graduates from other disciplines, including law, health, culture, science and education, also struggle to find employment after completing their studies, the NCHE found.

"Education has not typically been in this position, but this is the first time it is showing a high unemployment rate among graduates," NCHE deputy executive director Sylvia Demas said recently.

"We see that graduates from the agriculture field have the highest unemployment rate at 47%. This has consistently been the case over the years, with agriculture graduates recording the highest unemployment levels," she said.

Demas shared the findings during a stakeholder engagement with the National Council standing committee on education in Otjiwarongo recently.

The presentation also showed limited graduate entrepreneurship, with hospitality recording the highest self-employment rate at only 7%.

Questions around health graduates

The findings prompted committee members to question why unemployment remains high in the health sector despite a growing number of nursing training institutions.

One member noted that while only a handful of nursing institutions appear on the Namibia Qualifications Authority (NQA) website, many more operate, questioning whether regulatory shortcomings had contributed to graduate unemployment.

Demas said the rapid expansion of nursing colleges was largely driven by demand created during the Covid-19 pandemic.

"During Covid-19, there was a high demand for nurses in the labour market. As a result, many people realised that nursing had become a business opportunity," she said.

She said changes to the national school curriculum, which removed Grade 10 as an exit point, were not immediately matched by revised nursing admission requirements.

"As a result, students who did not proceed to Grades 11 and 12 found their way into nursing programmes," Demas said, adding that institutions were unable to raise entry requirements because Grade 10 remained the minimum requirement under health profession regulations.

She said the situation had since been addressed through new regulations introducing higher entry requirements, admission quotas and controls on student intake.

Concerns over graduate unemployment in nursing come despite severe staff shortages in the public health sector.

Last year, Health and Social Services Minister Esperance Luvindao said the ministry was operating at only 50% of its required staffing capacity, warning that the situation was placing enormous pressure on healthcare workers.

"We need more staff, more nurses, more doctors," Luvindao said at the time.

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