Yesha
Senior Member
- Jan 28, 2026
- 183
- 97
As thousands graduate from universities each year, Zimbabwe faces a growing challenge: how to turn an increasingly educated population into productive employment and sustainable livelihoods.
By Ayesha Nyanzunda
The caps and gowns are coming off across Zimbabwe's universities, but for thousands of young people, another and potentially more difficult journey is beginning.
The journey into the labour market.
This month alone, thousands of students have graduated from some of the country's biggest universities, providing a powerful reminder of Zimbabwe's expanding pool of educated young people.
At Chinhoyi University of Technology (CUT), 3,495 graduates were capped at the institution's 22nd graduation ceremony.
The University of Zimbabwe (UZ) has also held its 45th graduation ceremony, producing 7,132 graduates, while Midlands State University (MSU) is today holding its 27th graduation ceremony, with 7,888 graduands.
Together, the three ceremonies account for 18,515 graduates.
For the graduates and their families, these are moments of enormous achievement.
But behind the celebrations lies a difficult national question:
Where will all these graduates find work?
The question is becoming increasingly urgent as Zimbabwe produces more educated people while the formal economy struggles to generate enough quality jobs.
The issue is not that Zimbabwe has too many educated people.
Rather, the country has not created enough productive economic opportunities to absorb the human capital it is producing.
According to the Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency's (ZIMSTAT) Second Quarter 2025 Quarterly Labour Force Survey, 833,527 people were unemployed, representing an official unemployment rate of 20.7 percent among the population aged 16 and above.
The situation was significantly worse among young people.
Unemployment among those aged 15 to 24 stood at 39.3 percent, while the rate for those aged 15 to 35 was 28.9 percent.
When discouraged workers are included, Zimbabwe's expanded unemployment rate rose to 37.1 percent.
For young people aged 15 to 24, it reached 58.2 percent, while among those aged 15 to 35 it stood at 46.1 percent.
Perhaps even more worrying is the number of young people who are neither working nor studying.
ZIMSTAT estimated that 2.24 million people aged 15 to 35 were not in employment, education or training (NEET) in the second quarter of 2025.
That represented 49.2 percent of the country's 15–35 population.
Among those aged 15 to 24, about 1.27 million were classified as NEET, representing 47.6 percent of that age group.
These figures suggest that Zimbabwe's employment problem extends far beyond university graduates.
It is a broader crisis of young people struggling to make the transition from education into productive economic life.
ZIMSTAT recorded about 3.19 million employed people in the second quarter of 2025.
Of these, approximately 1.86 million were informally employed, compared with about 1.14 million in formal employment.
Informal employment accounted for 58.5 percent of employment, while formal employment accounted for 35.8 percent.
This means that many Zimbabweans who cannot find formal employment are finding other ways of surviving.
They are selling goods, operating small businesses, farming, providing services, freelancing, driving, trading and engaging in a variety of informal activities.
That resilience is one of the country's greatest strengths.
But it also exposes a weakness.
An economy in which the majority of employment is informal has limited capacity to provide the stability, career progression, social protection and productivity associated with formal employment.
For graduates, this can mean spending years acquiring qualifications only to enter an economy where their qualifications are not necessarily matched by appropriate opportunities.
ZIMCHE says it collects graduation statistics from all registered universities every year, allowing the country to assess the number and fields of graduates being produced. Its published 2018 statistics covered 21 registered universities, both public and private.
The historical data demonstrate the scale of the higher-education system.
Individual institutions have been producing thousands of graduates annually.
MSU, for example, has at various points graduated more than 6,000 students in a single year, while institutions such as UZ, CUT, NUST and Zimbabwe Open University have also produced thousands of graduates across different academic cycles.
The latest ceremonies demonstrate that this pipeline remains substantial.
But there is an important statistical gap.
While ZIMCHE collects national graduation data, a complete and consistently published public dataset covering every Zimbabwean university for every year from 2016 to 2025 is not readily available.
It would therefore be misleading to simply publish a figure claiming that Zimbabwe produced a particular number of graduates over the past decade without a complete national dataset.
What can be established with confidence is that Zimbabwe has been adding tens of thousands of university graduates to its labour pool over successive years, while the formal economy has not expanded at the same pace.
That is the central paradox.
Education remains one of the country's most important investments.
An educated population provides the skills needed for economic transformation, technological advancement, better public services and innovation.
The problem is what happens after education.
A country can produce thousands of engineers, but if it is not building enough factories, roads, mines, energy projects and technology companies, the engineers will struggle to find employment.
It can produce thousands of accountants, but if businesses remain small or close down, there will be limited demand for accounting services.
It can graduate lawyers, economists, marketers and human-resource specialists, but these professionals ultimately depend on an economy containing enough companies and institutions to employ them.
A university produces human capital.
It does not automatically produce the businesses and industries that use that human capital.
That responsibility lies with the broader economy.
Students can spend four years or more studying a particular discipline without gaining sufficient exposure to the workplace.
They may graduate with theoretical knowledge but little practical experience.
Employers, meanwhile, often want people who can immediately perform.
This creates a frustrating cycle.
The graduate needs a job to gain experience.
The employer wants experience before offering the job.
The graduate cannot get the experience because they cannot get the job.
Breaking this cycle requires a closer relationship between universities and employers.
Education must become more closely connected to production.
Under Germany's model, training takes place in two locations: the company and the vocational school.
Apprentices are employees of companies while they train and receive an allowance.
The system brings government, industry, companies and social partners into the training process.
The lesson is not that Zimbabwe should abandon university education.
Rather, it is that the workplace should become a much larger part of education.
Zimbabwe could expand structured apprenticeships in mining, engineering, construction, manufacturing, agriculture, automotive services, renewable energy, ICT, logistics and hospitality.
A student studying engineering should graduate having already worked on industrial projects.
A computer science student should have experience developing real products.
An agricultural student should have worked with commercial farmers or agribusinesses.
A tourism student should have practical experience in hotels, lodges, airlines or travel companies.
The transition from education to employment should not begin after graduation.
It should begin before graduation.
The World Bank says its Priority Skills for Growth programme trained nearly 24,000 young people between 2017 and 2024, with 82 percent employed or self-employed nine months after completing the training.
The programme was built around industry-led training and employer demand.
Importantly, 39 percent of self-employed graduates created at least one additional job.
The lesson is simple.
Training programmes should not begin with the question:
"What courses can we offer?"
They should begin with:
"What skills does the economy need?"
Zimbabwe needs much stronger labour-market intelligence.
Universities and colleges should know which sectors are expanding, what skills employers require and which qualifications are producing graduates who struggle to find employment.
The country needs highly skilled artisans and technicians just as much as it needs academics and professionals.
Germany's experience demonstrates how vocational education can be integrated into a respected national skills system rather than being treated as a second-choice option.
Zimbabwe should therefore invest much more heavily in Technical and Vocational Education and Training, while creating clear pathways for students to move between vocational and academic education.
Universities should certainly produce graduates capable of creating businesses rather than simply seeking employment.
But there is a danger in telling every unemployed graduate to become an entrepreneur.
Entrepreneurship requires an enabling environment.
A graduate cannot build a sustainable company without access to capital, reliable electricity, affordable internet, markets, equipment, premises and predictable regulations.
There is also a difference between survival entrepreneurship and growth entrepreneurship.
A graduate selling clothes from a street stall may be working and generating income.
But a company employing 50 people, paying taxes, exporting products and expanding production creates a much greater economic impact.
Zimbabwe's policies should therefore focus not only on starting businesses, but on helping viable businesses grow.
The University of Zimbabwe has reported the establishment of 75 start-ups, including 60 student-led businesses, as part of its push towards innovation and entrepreneurship.
This points towards a potentially important model.
Universities could become places where students do more than study.
They could become centres where students:
How many companies did the university help create?
How many patents were commercialised?
How many jobs were created by its graduates?
How many graduates were employed within six months or one year?
These would be much stronger measures of economic impact.
The country needs economic expansion.
It needs more companies.
More factories.
More construction.
More mining value addition.
More agro-processing.
More tourism.
More renewable energy.
More technology companies.
More exports.
More infrastructure.
This is where education and industrialisation meet.
Consider agriculture.
Zimbabwe does not simply need agricultural graduates.
It needs a complete agricultural value chain.
A farmer produces a crop.
A processor turns it into a product.
A manufacturer packages it.
A logistics company transports it.
A marketer builds the brand.
A retailer sells it.
An exporter takes it into regional and international markets.
Every stage creates employment.
The same principle applies to mining.
Zimbabwe has significant mineral resources, but the employment potential extends far beyond extraction.
A developed mining value chain requires geologists, engineers, metallurgists, technicians, environmental scientists, accountants, lawyers, transport companies, equipment suppliers, software developers and other professionals.
The more value added locally, the greater the potential employment multiplier.
They do not necessarily need a Zimbabwean employer.
A programmer in Harare can work for a company in London.
A designer in Bulawayo can serve clients in Johannesburg.
A digital marketer in Mutare can manage campaigns for a business in Nairobi.
A video editor in Gweru can work for an international content creator.
This creates the possibility of exporting services rather than people.
But that requires investment in broadband, electricity, digital payments, cybersecurity, internationally competitive skills and policies that make it easier for Zimbabweans to participate in the global digital economy.
The country should therefore think beyond the traditional question of:
"How many jobs can Zimbabwe create?"
It should also ask:
"How many Zimbabweans can we enable to earn from the global economy while living here?"
The government cannot become the employer of last resort for every graduate.
Zimbabwe's public sector has an important role, particularly in education, healthcare, infrastructure and administration.
But sustainable mass employment must ultimately come from a growing private sector and productive enterprises.
That means employment policy cannot be separated from investment policy.
If businesses cannot expand, they cannot employ.
If industries do not grow, graduates cannot be absorbed.
If companies cannot access finance, markets or infrastructure, employment will remain constrained.
The question of graduate unemployment is therefore also a question about the country's broader economic model.
The country should know:
Government could also introduce stronger incentives for companies that take on apprentices and recent graduates.
Publicly supported industrial projects could incorporate skills-development and employment targets.
Universities could expand work-integrated learning and industry partnerships.
TVET institutions could be strengthened and better connected to employers.
And government procurement could be used more strategically to help viable local businesses grow.
Most importantly, economic policy should focus on moving businesses from survival to expansion.
A country does not solve unemployment simply by creating more small businesses.
It solves unemployment when some of those businesses are able to become medium-sized and large employers.
Young people without economic opportunities can delay marriage, home ownership and starting families.
Parents who have invested years of savings in their children's education may see little return.
Skills can deteriorate when graduates spend years outside their professions.
Some will leave the country in search of opportunities elsewhere, contributing to a continued loss of skilled human capital.
Others will move into informal activities unrelated to their qualifications.
And for the economy, the opportunity cost is enormous.
A country that educates thousands of engineers, scientists, teachers, doctors, economists, technicians and entrepreneurs but cannot effectively use their skills is effectively leaving part of its productive capacity idle.
The achievements represented by the gowns and certificates are real.
The country has expanded access to higher education and produced a generation with considerable potential.
But the graduation ceremony should not be the end of the national conversation.
It should be the beginning.
The challenge now is to build an economy capable of absorbing, retaining and rewarding the people Zimbabwe has spent years educating.
The answer is not to produce fewer graduates.
It is not to discourage young people from pursuing higher education.
And it is not enough to tell them simply to "become entrepreneurs".
Zimbabwe needs to create the economic conditions in which education can translate into productivity.
That means education linked to industry, vocational training linked to employers, universities linked to innovation, businesses linked to capital and graduates linked to real opportunities.
The country's graduation season has once again demonstrated the scale of Zimbabwe's human capital.
The next challenge is turning that human capital into economic power.
Because the real measure of a university graduate's success is not simply whether they received a certificate.
It is whether the country gave them an opportunity to use it.
By Ayesha Nyanzunda
The caps and gowns are coming off across Zimbabwe's universities, but for thousands of young people, another and potentially more difficult journey is beginning.
The journey into the labour market.
This month alone, thousands of students have graduated from some of the country's biggest universities, providing a powerful reminder of Zimbabwe's expanding pool of educated young people.
At Chinhoyi University of Technology (CUT), 3,495 graduates were capped at the institution's 22nd graduation ceremony.
The University of Zimbabwe (UZ) has also held its 45th graduation ceremony, producing 7,132 graduates, while Midlands State University (MSU) is today holding its 27th graduation ceremony, with 7,888 graduands.
Together, the three ceremonies account for 18,515 graduates.
For the graduates and their families, these are moments of enormous achievement.
But behind the celebrations lies a difficult national question:
Where will all these graduates find work?
The question is becoming increasingly urgent as Zimbabwe produces more educated people while the formal economy struggles to generate enough quality jobs.
The issue is not that Zimbabwe has too many educated people.
Rather, the country has not created enough productive economic opportunities to absorb the human capital it is producing.
A YOUTH EMPLOYMENT CRISIS
Zimbabwe's latest official labour statistics paint a sobering picture.According to the Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency's (ZIMSTAT) Second Quarter 2025 Quarterly Labour Force Survey, 833,527 people were unemployed, representing an official unemployment rate of 20.7 percent among the population aged 16 and above.
The situation was significantly worse among young people.
Unemployment among those aged 15 to 24 stood at 39.3 percent, while the rate for those aged 15 to 35 was 28.9 percent.
When discouraged workers are included, Zimbabwe's expanded unemployment rate rose to 37.1 percent.
For young people aged 15 to 24, it reached 58.2 percent, while among those aged 15 to 35 it stood at 46.1 percent.
Perhaps even more worrying is the number of young people who are neither working nor studying.
ZIMSTAT estimated that 2.24 million people aged 15 to 35 were not in employment, education or training (NEET) in the second quarter of 2025.
That represented 49.2 percent of the country's 15–35 population.
Among those aged 15 to 24, about 1.27 million were classified as NEET, representing 47.6 percent of that age group.
These figures suggest that Zimbabwe's employment problem extends far beyond university graduates.
It is a broader crisis of young people struggling to make the transition from education into productive economic life.
THE INFORMAL ECONOMY IS ABSORBING THE SHOCK
The official unemployment figure also needs to be understood alongside Zimbabwe's huge informal economy.ZIMSTAT recorded about 3.19 million employed people in the second quarter of 2025.
Of these, approximately 1.86 million were informally employed, compared with about 1.14 million in formal employment.
Informal employment accounted for 58.5 percent of employment, while formal employment accounted for 35.8 percent.
This means that many Zimbabweans who cannot find formal employment are finding other ways of surviving.
They are selling goods, operating small businesses, farming, providing services, freelancing, driving, trading and engaging in a variety of informal activities.
That resilience is one of the country's greatest strengths.
But it also exposes a weakness.
An economy in which the majority of employment is informal has limited capacity to provide the stability, career progression, social protection and productivity associated with formal employment.
For graduates, this can mean spending years acquiring qualifications only to enter an economy where their qualifications are not necessarily matched by appropriate opportunities.
THE GRADUATE NUMBERS ARE GROWING
Zimbabwe has made considerable progress in expanding access to higher education.ZIMCHE says it collects graduation statistics from all registered universities every year, allowing the country to assess the number and fields of graduates being produced. Its published 2018 statistics covered 21 registered universities, both public and private.
The historical data demonstrate the scale of the higher-education system.
Individual institutions have been producing thousands of graduates annually.
MSU, for example, has at various points graduated more than 6,000 students in a single year, while institutions such as UZ, CUT, NUST and Zimbabwe Open University have also produced thousands of graduates across different academic cycles.
The latest ceremonies demonstrate that this pipeline remains substantial.
But there is an important statistical gap.
While ZIMCHE collects national graduation data, a complete and consistently published public dataset covering every Zimbabwean university for every year from 2016 to 2025 is not readily available.
It would therefore be misleading to simply publish a figure claiming that Zimbabwe produced a particular number of graduates over the past decade without a complete national dataset.
What can be established with confidence is that Zimbabwe has been adding tens of thousands of university graduates to its labour pool over successive years, while the formal economy has not expanded at the same pace.
That is the central paradox.
EDUCATION IS NOT THE PROBLEM
It would be wrong to conclude that Zimbabwe is producing too many graduates.Education remains one of the country's most important investments.
An educated population provides the skills needed for economic transformation, technological advancement, better public services and innovation.
The problem is what happens after education.
A country can produce thousands of engineers, but if it is not building enough factories, roads, mines, energy projects and technology companies, the engineers will struggle to find employment.
It can produce thousands of accountants, but if businesses remain small or close down, there will be limited demand for accounting services.
It can graduate lawyers, economists, marketers and human-resource specialists, but these professionals ultimately depend on an economy containing enough companies and institutions to employ them.
A university produces human capital.
It does not automatically produce the businesses and industries that use that human capital.
That responsibility lies with the broader economy.
THE EDUCATION-TO-EMPLOYMENT GAP
For many young Zimbabweans, the problem begins before graduation.Students can spend four years or more studying a particular discipline without gaining sufficient exposure to the workplace.
They may graduate with theoretical knowledge but little practical experience.
Employers, meanwhile, often want people who can immediately perform.
This creates a frustrating cycle.
The graduate needs a job to gain experience.
The employer wants experience before offering the job.
The graduate cannot get the experience because they cannot get the job.
Breaking this cycle requires a closer relationship between universities and employers.
Education must become more closely connected to production.
GERMANY'S LESSON: LEARN AND WORK AT THE SAME TIME
Zimbabwe could draw important lessons from Germany's dual vocational education and training system.Under Germany's model, training takes place in two locations: the company and the vocational school.
Apprentices are employees of companies while they train and receive an allowance.
The system brings government, industry, companies and social partners into the training process.
The lesson is not that Zimbabwe should abandon university education.
Rather, it is that the workplace should become a much larger part of education.
Zimbabwe could expand structured apprenticeships in mining, engineering, construction, manufacturing, agriculture, automotive services, renewable energy, ICT, logistics and hospitality.
A student studying engineering should graduate having already worked on industrial projects.
A computer science student should have experience developing real products.
An agricultural student should have worked with commercial farmers or agribusinesses.
A tourism student should have practical experience in hotels, lodges, airlines or travel companies.
The transition from education to employment should not begin after graduation.
It should begin before graduation.
RWANDA'S LESSON: TRAIN FOR THE ECONOMY THAT EXISTS
Rwanda provides another useful example.The World Bank says its Priority Skills for Growth programme trained nearly 24,000 young people between 2017 and 2024, with 82 percent employed or self-employed nine months after completing the training.
The programme was built around industry-led training and employer demand.
Importantly, 39 percent of self-employed graduates created at least one additional job.
The lesson is simple.
Training programmes should not begin with the question:
"What courses can we offer?"
They should begin with:
"What skills does the economy need?"
Zimbabwe needs much stronger labour-market intelligence.
Universities and colleges should know which sectors are expanding, what skills employers require and which qualifications are producing graduates who struggle to find employment.
TVET MUST BECOME A MAINSTREAM PATHWAY
Zimbabwe's unemployment debate also needs to challenge the perception that university is the only route to success.The country needs highly skilled artisans and technicians just as much as it needs academics and professionals.
- Electricians.
- Plumbers.
- Welders.
- Machinists.
- Motor vehicle technicians.
- Solar technicians.
- Construction specialists.
- Industrial maintenance technicians.
- Refrigeration specialists.
- Agricultural technicians.
- These are not inferior occupations.
Germany's experience demonstrates how vocational education can be integrated into a respected national skills system rather than being treated as a second-choice option.
Zimbabwe should therefore invest much more heavily in Technical and Vocational Education and Training, while creating clear pathways for students to move between vocational and academic education.
BUT ENTREPRENEURSHIP IS NOT A MAGIC SOLUTION
Zimbabwe's policy emphasis on entrepreneurship and innovation is important.Universities should certainly produce graduates capable of creating businesses rather than simply seeking employment.
But there is a danger in telling every unemployed graduate to become an entrepreneur.
Entrepreneurship requires an enabling environment.
A graduate cannot build a sustainable company without access to capital, reliable electricity, affordable internet, markets, equipment, premises and predictable regulations.
There is also a difference between survival entrepreneurship and growth entrepreneurship.
A graduate selling clothes from a street stall may be working and generating income.
But a company employing 50 people, paying taxes, exporting products and expanding production creates a much greater economic impact.
Zimbabwe's policies should therefore focus not only on starting businesses, but on helping viable businesses grow.
UNIVERSITIES CAN BECOME BUSINESS INCUBATORS
There are encouraging developments already emerging from Zimbabwe's universities.The University of Zimbabwe has reported the establishment of 75 start-ups, including 60 student-led businesses, as part of its push towards innovation and entrepreneurship.
This points towards a potentially important model.
Universities could become places where students do more than study.
They could become centres where students:
- develop products;
- commercialise research;
- establish companies;
- test technologies;
- access investors;
- work with industry;
- and create jobs.
How many companies did the university help create?
How many patents were commercialised?
How many jobs were created by its graduates?
How many graduates were employed within six months or one year?
These would be much stronger measures of economic impact.
INDUSTRIALISATION IS THE MISSING LINK
Ultimately, however, universities cannot solve Zimbabwe's unemployment crisis on their own.The country needs economic expansion.
It needs more companies.
More factories.
More construction.
More mining value addition.
More agro-processing.
More tourism.
More renewable energy.
More technology companies.
More exports.
More infrastructure.
This is where education and industrialisation meet.
Consider agriculture.
Zimbabwe does not simply need agricultural graduates.
It needs a complete agricultural value chain.
A farmer produces a crop.
A processor turns it into a product.
A manufacturer packages it.
A logistics company transports it.
A marketer builds the brand.
A retailer sells it.
An exporter takes it into regional and international markets.
Every stage creates employment.
The same principle applies to mining.
Zimbabwe has significant mineral resources, but the employment potential extends far beyond extraction.
A developed mining value chain requires geologists, engineers, metallurgists, technicians, environmental scientists, accountants, lawyers, transport companies, equipment suppliers, software developers and other professionals.
The more value added locally, the greater the potential employment multiplier.
THE DIGITAL ECONOMY OFFERS ANOTHER FRONTIER
Zimbabwe's young people also have an opportunity that previous generations did not have.They do not necessarily need a Zimbabwean employer.
A programmer in Harare can work for a company in London.
A designer in Bulawayo can serve clients in Johannesburg.
A digital marketer in Mutare can manage campaigns for a business in Nairobi.
A video editor in Gweru can work for an international content creator.
This creates the possibility of exporting services rather than people.
But that requires investment in broadband, electricity, digital payments, cybersecurity, internationally competitive skills and policies that make it easier for Zimbabweans to participate in the global digital economy.
The country should therefore think beyond the traditional question of:
"How many jobs can Zimbabwe create?"
It should also ask:
"How many Zimbabweans can we enable to earn from the global economy while living here?"
THE GOVERNMENT CANNOT EMPLOY EVERY GRADUATE
There is another reality that must be confronted.The government cannot become the employer of last resort for every graduate.
Zimbabwe's public sector has an important role, particularly in education, healthcare, infrastructure and administration.
But sustainable mass employment must ultimately come from a growing private sector and productive enterprises.
That means employment policy cannot be separated from investment policy.
If businesses cannot expand, they cannot employ.
If industries do not grow, graduates cannot be absorbed.
If companies cannot access finance, markets or infrastructure, employment will remain constrained.
The question of graduate unemployment is therefore also a question about the country's broader economic model.
WHAT SHOULD CHANGE?
Zimbabwe could begin by establishing a National Graduate Employment and Skills Observatory that tracks graduates for several years after university.The country should know:
- how many graduates find employment;
- how many become self-employed;
- how many remain unemployed;
- how many leave the country;
- which qualifications have the strongest employment outcomes;
- which skills employers are demanding;
- and how many graduate-founded businesses create jobs.
Government could also introduce stronger incentives for companies that take on apprentices and recent graduates.
Publicly supported industrial projects could incorporate skills-development and employment targets.
Universities could expand work-integrated learning and industry partnerships.
TVET institutions could be strengthened and better connected to employers.
And government procurement could be used more strategically to help viable local businesses grow.
Most importantly, economic policy should focus on moving businesses from survival to expansion.
A country does not solve unemployment simply by creating more small businesses.
It solves unemployment when some of those businesses are able to become medium-sized and large employers.
THE COST OF DOING NOTHING
The consequences of failing to address the problem go beyond unemployment statistics.Young people without economic opportunities can delay marriage, home ownership and starting families.
Parents who have invested years of savings in their children's education may see little return.
Skills can deteriorate when graduates spend years outside their professions.
Some will leave the country in search of opportunities elsewhere, contributing to a continued loss of skilled human capital.
Others will move into informal activities unrelated to their qualifications.
And for the economy, the opportunity cost is enormous.
A country that educates thousands of engineers, scientists, teachers, doctors, economists, technicians and entrepreneurs but cannot effectively use their skills is effectively leaving part of its productive capacity idle.
GRADUATION SHOULD BE THE BEGINNING, NOT THE END
Zimbabwe should continue celebrating its graduates.The achievements represented by the gowns and certificates are real.
The country has expanded access to higher education and produced a generation with considerable potential.
But the graduation ceremony should not be the end of the national conversation.
It should be the beginning.
The challenge now is to build an economy capable of absorbing, retaining and rewarding the people Zimbabwe has spent years educating.
The answer is not to produce fewer graduates.
It is not to discourage young people from pursuing higher education.
And it is not enough to tell them simply to "become entrepreneurs".
Zimbabwe needs to create the economic conditions in which education can translate into productivity.
That means education linked to industry, vocational training linked to employers, universities linked to innovation, businesses linked to capital and graduates linked to real opportunities.
The country's graduation season has once again demonstrated the scale of Zimbabwe's human capital.
The next challenge is turning that human capital into economic power.
Because the real measure of a university graduate's success is not simply whether they received a certificate.
It is whether the country gave them an opportunity to use it.
