Entrepreneurship in PracticeNo Access

Entrepreneurial Training for Unemployed Adults: Challenges and Opportunities in Accessing Financial Services in South Africa

Celestin Mayombe

School of Built Environment and Development Studies, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 4041, South Africa

E-mail Address: celestin-may@hotmail.com

https://doi.org/10.1142/S0218495816500163Cited by:3 (Source: Crossref)

Abstract

Entrepreneurship training programmes and self-employment initiatives for unemployed adults has become a new frontier for poverty reduction in South Africa. This article investigates the types of challenges graduates encounter and opportunities in accessing financial services in order to start-up and grow an own micro-enterprise in South Africa. The main findings reveal that micro-finance institutions are keen to grant loans and credits to graduates from entrepreneurial training centres. However, graduates are not eligible for credits because they fail to meet the security requirements of the lending banks due to their socio-economic situations. The author concludes that if centre managers do not involve micro-finance institutions prior to the training delivery and transition stages of the entrepreneurial training programmes, graduates will continue finding it difficult to access financial services and enter self-employment after obtaining the required entrepreneurship skills.

Keywords:

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