The year 2010 will be an important one for SA for two reasons. First, this country will become the first African host of the soccer World Cup, which will demand huge infrastructural development. Second, government wants the economy to be growing by more than 6% by that year. Both pose a serious challenge to the country's skills supply and development.
There is a concerted effort from government to encourage their development.
On the other hand, finance minister Trevor Manuel told the FM in December 2005 that it would be the soft issues, such as education and skills training, and what government does about them that will decide whether government achieves its target of sustained 6% GDP growth by 2010.
The failure of the education system to produce enough relevant-skilled individuals - from plumbers and toolmakers, to engineers - is one of the main reasons the economic growth of the past few years has not reduced unemployment levels. It is encouraging, though, that both government and corporates are taking skills development seriously. Corporate SA's commitment is evident in its participation in the levy grant system. The labour department says nine in 10 companies have registered with the Sector Education & Training Authority (Seta) relevant to their areas of operation.
Setas were initiated by government to streamline training and encourage corporates to develop their workforce, while receiving tax rebates.
Deputy president Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka is proposing to cabinet that Setas focus on retraining thousands of unemployed graduates who need skills to enter the job market.
The Black Business Executive Circle (BBEC) says more than 3m employees had received training by March 2005 in all sectors, 80 000 learners obtained learnerships and more than 600 learnerships were registered. It says agriculture and fishery workers are most in need of skills upgrades.
There has been steady progress towards achieving employment equity targets in the country, though white professionals still outnumber their black counterparts.
Disabled persons from all races are still underrepresented. The government report shows that only 1% of recruits are people with disabilities.
Another measure used by government is workforce movement - the recruitment of new personnel and promotions - which showed that blacks accounted for 41% of top management recruits, 38% in senior management positions and 47% for professional and middle management.
The recruitment of females is not impressive either, with only 27% recruited to legislator level and 14,1% to top management posts.
Super Group, which retained its empowerment dominance in the transport sector, says its employment and skills development strategy is linked. Instead of retrenching white staff, the company ensured that experienced white managers shared their knowledge with black staff targeted for management positions.
Black representation in top management within Super Group has grown from 9% in 2004 to about 14% last year. Operationally, 81% of staff are black compared with 69% in 2004.
Retail group Foschini leads the stakes in the skills development segment. Having topped the retail sector since 2005, the group has spent R16,7m on skills development - including 30% paid to the skills development levy. The group says in excess of 121 learnerships were in place during 2005 and these were sourced from both inside and outside the group.
The Don group wanted to achieve a women to men ratio of 51:49 from levels of 54:46, and to improve representation of previously disadvantaged and disabled individuals in management positions. This is fast being realised.
Today, the group has 66% black representation in senior management, with the same percentage for black women in the same position. Blacks account for 80% of middle management - a good indication of sustained supply of black personnel to senior positions. Overall, 92% of its staff is black.
