Growth without jobs: the dilemma facing Mozambican youth
- Dr Ruth Castel-Branco
In 2024-25, tens of thousands of Mozambicans took to the streets in an unprecedented popular uprising. Although catalysed by disputed general elections, protesters’ demands extended beyond electoral accountability to decent work, affordable housing and quality public services. For many young people, the uprising represented a second liberation struggle against a regime they see as corrupt, unresponsive and aligned with global capital.
Mozambique presents a striking paradox. It has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the region, yet among the lowest levels of salaried employment. Most people have little choice but to try to cobble together a livelihood through a multiplicity of informal activities. And while small-scale agriculture remains an important source of livelihood, absorbing three quarters of the population, it is increasingly viewed as a strategy of last resort.
Over the past two decades, Mozambique has attracted significant foreign investment in the energy and mining sectors. The Sasol gas project in Inhambane Province was among the first major investments of this kind. Since 2004, more than 80 billion cubic metres of natural gas have been produced, most of it exported to South Africa. While the project has supported a large industrial ecosystem in South Africa, employment opportunities for Mozambicans have been limited relative to the scale of investment.
The Sasol gas project reveals a broader conundrum facing the Mozambican government: despite hopes that foreign direct investment could be leveraged to advance structural transformation, the exact opposite has taken place. The concentration of investment in capita-intensive extractive industries has crowded out manufacturing, reinforcing dependence on primary commodity exports and imported manufactured goods, and undermining employment creation.
Against this backdrop, the government of Mozambique has embarked on the development of a new National Employment Policy, aimed at strengthening both demand and supply-side interventions. In collaboration with the ITC/ILO and SCIS, they have organised series of public policy dialogues.