The Agency derives its mandate from the legislative frameworks, including the National Youth Development Agency Act, 2008 (Act 54 of 2008) (NYDA Act), the National Development Plan 2030, the National Youth Policy 2030 and the approved Integrated Youth Development Strategy (IYDS 2022/2025). The Agency assumed and improved the operational platform developed by the merger of the National Youth Commission and the Umsobomvu Youth Fund, which rendered the Agency operational with immediate effect. In addition, the staff component of its predecessors was also incorporated into the NYDA. The strategy of the NYDA can be summarized as follows:

The NYDA Act no 54 of 2008 further mandates the NYDA to develop and implement an Integrated Youth Development Strategy (IYDS) for South Africa and initiate, design, coordinate, evaluate and monitor all programmes that aim to integrate the youth into the economy and society in general. These initiated programmes aim to alleviate poverty, urban and rural development, combating of crime and substance abuse as well as social decay amongst youth. The NYDA lobbied other organs of state to consider national priorities in respect of youth development when planning their activities regarding their implementation of youth development priorities.The NYDA will continue to monitor and evaluate youth development interventions across the board and mobilize youth for active participation in civil society engagements.

The IYDS has been designed as a strategy that any role-player could get involved in at any point in time. The primary role within this strategy is for the NYDA to act as a catalyst.

The NYDA with the support of the Office of the Presidency, can create the political will and momentum within the Government, to allow the Integrated Youth Development Strategy to gain the traction that is required for successful implementation. The opportunity to influence what other Departments are doing in the youth development space must be driven quite strongly by both the NYDA and the Presidency.

The main aim is to make youth development part and parcel of what other line departments are delivering, to the point where organizational and individual performance agreements include youth development as a clear area of focus. The role is, therefore, to remove barriers to success and to assist with the development and delivery of critical success factors. Our role can broadly be described as to:

• Provide planning and decision-making information for projects.
• Coordinate key engagements.
• Facilitate critical discussions and ease projects through conceptualization into the design and ultimately implementation.
• Establish key partnerships with private sector organizations at national, provincial and local levels.
• Monitoring, evaluation and reporting requirements of the liaison function.