How Sanlam and YES are growing tourism through youth entrepreneurship

A powerful partnership between Sanlam and YES is helping drive inclusive growth by empowering young South Africans, while strengthening one of the country’s most dynamic sectors – tourism.

Impact at a Glance

• 1040 youth jobs created nationwide through Y4T
• R75 million injected into the economy through salaries
• 373 digital gigs completed by youth creatives, generating R2.2 million in revenue
• 60 youth-owned SMMEs supported through Youth4Business (Y4B)

Tourism is one of South Africa’s largest job creators and a proven driver of inclusive growth. The industry contributes significantly to GDP through accommodation, food services, transport, and conservation, employing millions directly and indirectly. As the industry rebounds after COVID-19 - with domestic tourism expenditure in South Africa recovering and exceeding its pre-pandemic level - its continued recovery depends on a skilled and digitally savvy workforce able to shape and share the stories that attract visitors.

To meet this need, Sanlam and YES launched two high-impact initiatives – Youth4Tourism and Youth4Business - designed to create employment, build skills, and support youth-owned SMMEs. Y4T develops a skilled tourism workforce through practical work experience, technical training, and income opportunities, while Y4B helps young entrepreneurs formalise, scale, and create jobs in the digital, creative, and green economies. Together, these programmes reignite momentum in tourism and the broader visitor economy by linking training, income, and entrepreneurship within a single model, leveraging the YES framework and corporate funding to strengthen one of South Africa’s most vital sectors.

Paul Hanratty, CEO of Sanlam, has previously expressed the organisation’s commitment to providing opportunities for South African youth to thrive, saying, “Millions of young people across Africa leave school or university without a clear pathway to work. In South Africa, youth unemployment remains a national crisis, with more than 60% of young people unable to find jobs. The gig economy - powered by digital platforms that connect freelancers with clients for short-term projects and asset-sharing - has rapidly expanded, creating new avenues for productivity and employment.

“As an organisation committed to empowering generations to be financially confident, secure, and prosperous, we recognise the vital role of collaboration in fostering youth employability through initiatives like this.”

Guided by a purpose-led strategy, Sanlam approaches transformation as a measurable, long-term commitment. Its focus on economic empowerment, education and entrepreneurship drives financial resilience and inclusive growth, aligning the group’s social impact agenda with the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

Investing in the next generation of talent

Sanlam has been an early and active YES partner since 2018. Inside the business, more than 300 youth have been placed in future-fit roles, including software development, data analysis, and finance. This early commitment signals a belief that corporate South Africa can build skills at scale and expand pathways into high-demand careers.

In 2023, Sanlam extended its impact into the visitor economy with Youth4Tourism to unlock talent where recovery and growth are converging. Youth were placed into tourism-related roles across the country, with support from other corporate partners.

Youth4Tourism has created 1040 youth jobs nationwide and injected R75 million into the economy through salaries. Youth in the marketing and creative sectors played a key role in the initiative’s success, executing 373 digital gigs to promote local destinations and enterprises, generating R2.2 million in revenue while lifting the visibility of places that often sit outside traditional travel circuits. The programme builds role readiness for service jobs while bringing vital digital marketing capacity to small operators that need it most.

From jobs to businesses

“Engaging young people to promote and support tourist attractions through digital content creation, along with upskilling them in the gig economy, can lead to the birth of microentrepreneurs who become the backbone[NM1] of our economy,” says Thandeka Nkambule, Chief Transformation Officer of Sanlam.

Nkambule emphasises that, if employment is the starting line, then entrepreneurship is the next logical step. In 2024, Sanlam and YES launched Youth4Business to back 60 youth-owned SMMEs across the digital and green economy, and the creative industries.

The support is holistic and practical:

• Grant funding helps founders to invest in growth.
• Accounting and compliance services remove early administrative hurdles.
• Financial planning, mentorship, and business advisory services help owners to make better decisions.
• Legal, marketing, and digital support ensures that young entrepreneurs can access markets confidently.

The aim is to improve survival rates at the stage where many youth-led businesses stall, and to move founders[NM2] from subsistence to growth.

Why the model works

The approach is deliberate.Within Sanlam, young people move into roles that demand data literacy, commercial discipline, and collaboration. In tourism, Youth4Tourism links work experience with the digital discovery that now shapes traveller choices, which makes youth contributions visible in both service quality and demand generation. In enterprise development, Youth4Business tackles the practical reasons that cause early-stage enterprises to fail, then pairs entrepreneurs with advisory services and market access to accelerate sustainable growth.

Across the programmes, the thread is the same: Income meets learning. Skills meet opportunity. Corporate resources meet community and ambition. The circle closes when participants progress into permanent roles, when small operators grow into employers, and when the visibility of local destinations improves because young content creators are telling authentic stories from the ground.

Recognition has followed the results. At the 2024 YES ESG Awards, held during the ESG Africa Awards at the Sandton Convention Centre, Sanlam was honoured as a Top YES Youth Job Contributor and received a Special ESG Award, with a certificate signed by President Cyril Ramaphosa. At this year’s awards, Sanlam Life Insurance received an award for Entrepreneurship & ESD Integration.[NM3] Awards do not create impact, but they do signal that delivery is real and that sustainable partnerships between business and youth can transform communities.

The road ahead

Tourism will continue to be a lever for jobs and small business creation. Youth will continue to be the source of energy that turns potential into performance. Partnerships like Sanlam and YES succeed because they align business needs, social impact, and national priorities within a single operating model. The formula is simple, the execution is not, and that is where committed partners and innovative partnerships matter. DM