Teaching sewing and business skills to vulnerable youth and women in South Africa

ACT-Growth for All has aligned with the Yes We Can South Africa Foundation, a non profit company that empowers youth and mothers by skills training in sewing and business start up and management based in Cape Town, South Africa, since 2017.

This training not only teaches how to sew but also the business skills the women need, to make sewing their business.
Once the training is completed (5 classes are required to become a beginner seamstress) the learner receives a certificate. Every class, a product is made in class and the student takes it home to have something to showcase to families, friends, members of the church and schools.
The duration of each sewing class is 3 hours and costs only R100 per lesson ($6.50 USD). All materials and machinery is provided by the Foundation.
Creating entrepreneurship through sewing

Susara Adams joined the program in January 2018 and has now opened her own business in Gugulethu. Besides sewing for Yes We Can, she gives private classes. Susara is extremely creative and a life-long learner. She applies all the entrepreneurial skills and takes her sewing machine along with her to clients’ homes, should they not have one of their own, to teach them. She is patient and loves sharing her passion for sewing!  
She became specialised in making washable and re-usable sanitary and breast pads. These pads can also be made by hand, which Susara is very happy to teach her clients who do not have sewing machines. She passes on her knowledge of where to get the material and how to make the pads for self-use or to sell them to neighbours, friends, family or schools.
The learner becomes teacher

​Phakama Pearl Ntsodo joined YesWeCan at the same time as Susara Adams.      
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She is a single mother of two children and rents a home in Khayelitsha. She had basic sewing knowledge and since starting with us, she is thriving as a seamstress.

​She knows how to make every item in our collection and has become a facilitator of our sewing and entrepreneurial classes.