Youth aspirations and entrepreneurial motivation in agriculture: insights from smallholder farmers in OR Tambo District, Eastern Cape

Agriculture holds untapped potential for youth empowerment and rural development in South Africa, particularly in regions such as the Eastern Cape, where unemployment and poverty are widespread. While often perceived as an unattractive career, a growing number of youth are redefining agriculture as a viable entrepreneurial path. This study explores the motivational drivers, enabling conditions, and challenges shaping youth participation in smallholder agriculture within the OR Tambo District Municipality. Using a qualitative narrative inquiry approach, in-depth interviews were conducted with 70 purposively selected youth farmers (aged 18–35) across three municipalities. Thematic analysis revealed that youth engagement is driven by both intrinsic motivations such as passion for farming, cultural identity, and self-reliance and extrinsic factors, including land inheritance, familial support, and selective access to institutional programs. Nonetheless, substantial structural challenges such as limited formal land tenure, financing constraints, and weak institutional support persist. Despite these constraints, youth displayed notable innovation and resilience, leveraging digital tools, value-added processing, and collective marketing to sustain their enterprises. Youth aspirations for scaling up, Agri-processing, and digital entrepreneurship reflect a strong commitment to transforming rural agriculture. The study concludes that aligning agricultural support systems with youth motivations, lived realities, and structural barriers is critical to fostering inclusive and sustainable agripreneurship. Based on the study, it is recommended that policymakers need flexible financing models tailored for youth, gender-sensitive land tenure reforms, and investment in decentralised, youth-focused extension and market access programs. Strengthening rural infrastructure and digital connectivity and embedding youth voices in policy design processes will be crucial for fostering inclusive and sustainable agripreneurship.