Mr Price Foundation’s youth empowerment and enablement programmes delivered measurable economic and educational returns in FY2026, the first year of its 10-year strategy to empower 500,000 South African youth by 2035. The results, detailed in the Foundation’s newly released Integrated Impact Report FY2026, follow R39.2 million in programme investment across skills, entrepreneurship and education.
The Foundation directed 79.8% of total expenditure to programmes and projects, prioritising interventions that demonstrate quantifiable value to young people and to the employers, businesses and schools they work with.
The clearest evidence sits in the Retail Frontline Programme. Employers hiring through the programme achieved a 2:1 interview-to-hire ratio, against a traditional 4:1 benchmark, alongside 19% lower termination rates and estimated savings of R3,132 per hire.
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These efficiencies carry particular weight as businesses navigate constrained hiring budgets and cost pressures, against a backdrop of 40.6% unemployment among South Africans aged 25 to 34.
“We set ourselves an ambition to empower 500,000 young South Africans by 2035, and FY2026 was about strengthening the model before we scale it,” said Octavius Phukubye, Executive Director of Mr Price Foundation. “We want every investment to translate into meaningful outcomes which are about helping a young person move into work, an employer hire more efficiently, a young business grow, or a school strengthen the foundations for future opportunity.”
Converting training into employment
The Foundation trained 10,167 unemployed youth through its Skills Development portfolio, with 7,274 securing employment opportunities, a 71.5% placement rate. Of those placed, 5,811 were absorbed into Mr Price Group divisions, 616 placed with external partners and 847 employed elsewhere.
The demand-led model calibrates training to real workplace requirements across retail, manufacturing and agriculture, giving employers a pipeline of candidates positioned to contribute from the outset.
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Capital and mentorship for business growth
In Entrepreneurship Development, the Foundation supported 1,241 youth entrepreneurs and disbursed R1.53 million in seed funding to 27 businesses through the Bindzu Youth Fund.
The funded businesses achieved average revenue growth of 24.5% and created at least 125 new jobs, excluding business owners. Seed capital is paired with business development, mentorship, coaching and market access support, strengthening the commercial sustainability of youth-owned enterprises.
Building the foundations for future opportunity
The Education Development portfolio reached 14,983 learners across 32 schools and supported 405 educators and 86 School Management Team members. Learners recorded an average 16% improvement across literacy and numeracy assessments, while all 21 schools in the EduRise Legacy Programme met key operational benchmarks by the end of the programme, up from 28% previously.
FY2026 also marked the conclusion of the four-year Roots & Shoots Study, which tracked approximately 580 children from Grade R to Grade 3. The study found that early learning gains can fade without continued access to quality teaching throughout the Foundation Phase; this evidence now informs the design of future education interventions.
Across its three portfolios, the Foundation’s programmes empowered 12,180 young people in FY2026.
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Diversifying the funding base
Alongside institutional and corporate funding, the Foundation’s Hope4Youth campaign gave Mr Price Group customers a direct way to contribute, generating R3.8 million in FY2026 through more than 288,000 individual donations made at checkout, in-store and online, across 1,638 stores nationwide.
Looking ahead
The Foundation’s 2035 strategy targets the meaningful economic participation of 500,000 young South Africans, with an average social return on investment of R10 for every rand deployed over the 10-year period.
“As we enter year two, our focus is on taking what the evidence tells us works and building the partnerships that will allow us to extend that impact responsibly,” said Phukubye. “Reaching 500,000 young people will require business, government, communities and civil society to work together. The opportunity now is to turn strong early outcomes into impact.”