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South Africa has an exceptionally high unemployment rate, in recent years it has been over 50% for young people aged 15-24.

In 2013, in an attempt to contribute to a solution, Grassroot Soccer, with the support of USAID and Barclays, started the Coach Development Program.

Since its inception in 2002, Grassroot Soccer has reached almost 2,000,000 youth. They began working in South Africa in 2006, as a locally registered nonprofit, and have reached more than 200,000 youth in the past decade. These youth have had access to sexual reproductive health and gender education, HIV/AIDS testing, treatment and care, youth leadership and career guidance, and physical fitness and health services.

Grassroot Soccer has tremendously reduced the stigma around HIV/AIDS within the communities that they work, successfully using the game of soccer to give South African youth life-saving information, confidence and hope.