14/08/2026
🇱🇸 DID YOU KNOW? LESOTHO IS INVESTING BILLIONS IN YOUNG PEOPLE — BUT ARE WE BUILDING AN ECONOMY FOR THEM TO ENTER?
Over the last five years, according to the figures presented below, Lesotho has allocated approximately M5.9 billion to NMDS tertiary loans:
2022: M1,030,202,100
2023: M1,109,200,000
2024: M1,164,660,000
2025: M1,208,059,063
2026: M1,384,705,269
TOTAL: M5,896,826,432
Education is undeniably one of the most important investments a country can make.
We need educated doctors.
We need engineers.
We need agricultural scientists.
We need teachers.
We need economists.
We need lawyers.
We need ICT specialists.
We need researchers.
We need entrepreneurs and professionals across every sector of our economy.
But this raises a much deeper question:
WHAT HAPPENS AFTER GRADUATION?
If the country invests billions in developing human capital, but graduates enter an economy that does not have enough productive opportunities to absorb their skills, we create a dangerous disconnect between:
EDUCATION → SKILLS → EMPLOYMENT → PRODUCTIVITY → ECONOMIC GROWTH
Education produces human capital.
But the economy must create the structures through which that human capital becomes productive.
This is where our national conversation needs to go.
The question should not simply be:
“Are we spending too much money on university education?”
We should also ask:
“ARE WE INVESTING ENOUGH IN THE ECONOMIC SYSTEM THAT WILL EMPLOY AND UTILISE THE PEOPLE WE ARE EDUCATING?”
A qualified agricultural scientist without a functioning agricultural industry is underutilised human capital.
A qualified engineer without infrastructure and industrial opportunities is underutilised human capital.
A qualified ICT graduate without a digital economy capable of absorbing their skills is underutilised human capital.
A qualified business graduate without a growing private sector is underutilised human capital.
The problem, therefore, may not simply be the number of graduates.
The problem may also be the productive capacity of our economy.
This is why youth unemployment cannot be solved through education alone.
And it cannot be solved through Government employment alone.
We need to build an economy that creates productive opportunities.
That means developing:
• Agriculture and agribusiness
• Agro-processing
• Manufacturing
• ICT and digital services
• Tourism
• Renewable energy
• Construction and infrastructure
• Mining value chains
• Creative industries
• Export-oriented businesses
• Research and innovation
• Small and medium enterprises
And this is where agriculture becomes particularly important.
Agriculture should not be viewed simply as an occupation for people who did not go to university.
Agriculture is science.
Agriculture is technology.
Agriculture is engineering.
Agriculture is business.
Agriculture is finance.
Agriculture is logistics.
Agriculture is processing.
Agriculture is trade.
We need agricultural graduates participating in the sector they were trained for.
But that requires us to professionalise, structure and systemise agriculture.
We need to build agricultural ecosystems where a young graduate can move from:
QUALIFICATION → OPPORTUNITY → ENTERPRISE → MARKET → INCOME → SCALE.
The same principle applies across the economy.
WE CANNOT ONLY BUILD PEOPLE.
WE MUST ALSO BUILD THE ECONOMY THAT CAN USE THEIR POTENTIAL.
This is the bigger conversation around youth economic independence.
Young Basotho do not only need certificates.
They need economic pathways.
They need markets.
They need finance.
They need infrastructure.
They need industries.
They need businesses.
They need platforms.
They need opportunities to create value.
And they need an economy capable of turning knowledge into productivity.
Therefore, perhaps the most important question for Lesotho is not:
“How many graduates are we producing?”
But:
“HOW MANY PRODUCTIVE ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES ARE WE BUILDING FOR THE GRADUATES WE PRODUCE?”
Education and economic development must move together.
We cannot educate young people for an economy we have not built.
We must build the economy alongside the education system.
That is how education becomes more than a cost.
It becomes an investment that produces economic returns for the individual, the family and the nation.
🇱🇸 Re tshwanetse ho aha batho — empa hape re tshwanetse ho aha moruo o tla sebelisa bokhoni ba bona.
