Engcobo Local Municipality claims the most youthful population, as well as the highest rates of poverty and unemployment, in the Chris Hani District Municipality, coupled with a high dependency ratio. The economy is underperforming and currently fails to create needed jobs and revenues. A dedicated LED strategy has been developed in order to guide interventions in turning this situation around. The municipality’s low productivity score points to the low GDP per worker (formal and informal), a relative shortage of skills available to the economy, and low growth. On a broad scale, the Engcobo Municipality has some striking features: it is a peripheral area in terms of the national economy, is underdeveloped, has a fragmented settlement pattern, has a low-density rural settlement environment, and its resource base is under pressure. On the scale of urban development, Engcobo Town is classified as a Sub-District Development Node by CHDM (i. e. it is amongst a group of towns deemed to be o