By Jeremiah Ndjoze

The National Youth Fund which was duly capitalised to the tune of N$257 million recently, will line up its next batch of young entrepreneurs who are set to benefit from the government initiative during the first week of August 2025.
This revelation was made by President Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah, during her recent presentation of her administration’s achievements in its first 100 days. 
 

The fund, whose main objective is to address youth unemployment by providing access to capital and supporting businesses to scale up. Nandi-Ndaitwah  revealed that the fund issued its first disbursements of production equipment and capacity building to 196 small and medium enterprises on 11 July 2025.       
 

“Drawn from all 14 regions, 28 youth were trained in gemstone and jewellery processing, 64 in agro-processing standards and 13 in cosmetics production," said Nandi-Ndaitwah. "New beneficiaries will continue to be identified and the next call for enterprise support programmes will be issued in the first week of August 2025 by the line ministry,” the President said describing these as golden opportunities that young people must exploit maximally.
 

Nandi-Ndaitwah further said that efforts are underway to repurpose existing industrial parks into fully operational entrepreneurial centres, for which the list of viable sites will be finalised before end of August 2025. 
Meanwhile, a joint technical committee comprising of the ministries of education, innovation, youth, sport, arts and culture aswell as that of finance, was established to coordinate the implementation of the youth fund, agricultural cooperatives and internship or apprenticeship programmes.
 

Nandi-Ndaitwah told the gathering that the National Youth Fund will be accessed through financial institutions such as Development Bank of Namibia, AgriBank, NamPost and the Environmental Investment Fund. 
“A guarantee facility from NASRIA was secured in May 2025 to improve access to non-collateralised lending for young entrepreneurs. The Fund will become operational mid-August 2025. 
 

Additional support of N$5 million has been mobilised from NamibRe towards the National Youth Fund,” the head of State added. 
“Namibia also received N$33.4 million under the Global Accelerator 1 programme to support youth entrepreneurship and job creation in the biomass sector. 
 

Under the Equipment Aid Scheme and the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprise Development Fund, over 200 youth-led businesses were selected countrywide for support during the reporting period.” 
 

The National Youth Fund falls under priority sector three of the seven identified priority sectors which Nandi-Ndaitwah unveiled during her inaugural address along with eight critical economic enablers. The seven identified priority sectors are agriculture, sports, youth empowerment, quality education and training; creative industries; quality health and social welfare and land, housing & sanitation.
 

“Agriculture, mining, energy, oil and gas, tourism, water, fisheries and transport and logistics are the most critical enabling economic areas.”