A young chef from Melbourne has started up a cafe in Hobart to provide training for locals struggling to find work.

When Emily Briffa moved to Hobart one of the first things she noticed was Tasmania had a major problem with unemployment.

Ms Briffa decided to quit her job and start up the Hamlet cafe.

The cafe now employs eight paid staff, with the rest of the workers made up by volunteers.

It has only been open for three months, but already more than 20 volunteers have gone on to secure paid work.

Tasmania has the second highest unemployment rate in Australia and parts of the state have the nation's highest youth unemployment rates.

Ms Briffa said setting while up a business can be difficult, she had decided the positives outweighed the negatives.

"The social benefit I get from this far outweighs the financial benefit that you can get from having a job," she said.

Emily Briffa started Hamlet cafe when she noticed the high unemployment rates in Tasmania. ( ABC News: Felicity Ogilvie )

Profits used to hire volunteers as staff

Alex Morris-Baguley, a volunteer at Hamlet, has been gaining work experience working there by taking orders and serving customers food and coffees.

"I just love serving all the customers that come here" she said.

Ms Briffa said the volunteers from Hamlet had moved into a variety of different industries, even some as far away from hospitality as construction.

"A couple of them have gone into other cafes, which is really nice," she said.

"Some of them have gone into things like beauty therapy — this [volunteering at Hamlet] has just been a bit of a stepping stone for them."

Ms Briffa also uses the cafe profits to reinvest into hiring more staff, creating paid work for the volunteers who want to stay on.

Alex Morris-Baguley, a Hamlet cafe volunteer. ( ABC News: Felicity Ogilvie )

Alice Stephenson, another volunteer, said before she started working as a volunteer in the kitchen she was struggling to secure any work.

But now she has a paid casual job at Hamlet.

"I'm just so happy to be in the kitchen and cooking, they allow me to bake and do whatever I love," she said.

"It's just a beautiful environment, I love all the customers and serving, so I'm so lucky basically."

One of Hamlet's regular customers is David Bartlett, the former premier of Tasmania.

"One of the extraordinary things about this place is the new pathways they're providing for people with disadvantages to get into work," he said.

"And they're doing it in a not-for-profit way, providing work and skills-based opportunities that don't need to be subsidised by government, but provide great opportunities for people who wouldn't get them otherwise."