Rural youth interest in economic activities along the agricultural value chain: empirical evidence from KwaZulu-Natal (South Africa) and implications

Identifying which agricultural activities rural youth would be interested to participate in and understanding which factors are enabling and constraining their participation is essential in attempting to alleviate rural youth unemployment and ameliorate the poor succession plan in smallholder agriculture. Employing a recent household survey dataset, descriptive statistics, and multinomial logit regression, this study sought to examine this issue. A structured questionnaire was designed and administered to 152 rural youth from Amajuba and Umzinyathi districts in KwaZulu-Natal Province. The study showed that rural youth are interested in engaging in all activities along the agricultural value chain. The factors enhancing their interest include access to resources and services (agricultural training, land, information, and communication technologies), age, and having a household member engaged in agriculture. However, access to other resources and services (formal education, social media, finance, psychological capital, and wealth), and dependency ratio were found to negatively affect their interest. These findings suggest that policymakers should formulate strategies that are sensitive to the resource endowment and access to services of the rural youth when aiming at engaging them in agricultural activities.