Webinar invitation: Time to deliver on ANC promises of “jobs, jobs, jobs” and a “skills revolution”

Event details

Date: Tuesday 08/10/2024

Time: 10h00 - 11h00

Speakers:

Dr Anthea Jeffery, IRR Head of Policy Research

Hermann Pretorius, IRR Head of Strategic Communications

Register to join: https://streamyard.com/watch/GDvFRcBrshqh

The ANC has been promising “Jobs, Jobs, Jobs” since before the 1994 election. It’s been pledging to bring about “a skills revolution” for almost as long. Yet the unemployment rate in June 2024 was 33.5%, while the skills shortage remains dire too.

These are some of the key points in a new report from the Institute of Race Relations (IRR), Generating Jobs and Skills for Growth and Prosperity, the latest in the Blueprint for Growth series.

Says Dr Anthea Jeffery, author of the report and the IRR’s head of policy research: “In a hobbled economy growing very slowly and unable to generate jobs on anything like the scale required, people have become increasingly desperate for work. In June 2023, for example, Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi advertised 8,000 job vacancies across various provincial departments and received an extraordinary 1.2 million applications.”

Overcoming South Africa’s unemployment crisis is “a moral imperative”, adds Jeffery, as well as an economic and political one. “That 8.4 million people are jobless on the official definition – and four million more on the expanded one – is a human tragedy.”

Equally serious is the country’s failure to provide sound skills to all its youth via effective schools, TVET colleges and universities. More than half the country’s pupils leave school without a matric, even on a 35% pass rate. TVET colleges and SETAs are hopeless at technical and on-the-job training. Universities struggle with poorly prepared students and high drop-out rates. “Free” tertiary education is costly and wasteful.

The government of national unity (GNU) has identified both growth and jobs as key priorities. This offers new hope that essential policy changes are now within the country’s grasp.

Relatively minor amendments to labour laws could make it easier for millions to find work, as Dr Jeffery’s report explains. Achieving sound skills development is more complex. In a nutshell, what it needs is thinking “outside the box” on how to increase efficiency and value through competition and innovation.

Join us on 8^th October for the online launch of the paper, in which Dr Jeffery will be joined by the IRR’s Hermann Pretorius to discuss the reforms needed to generate jobs and skills to help stimulate growth and increase prosperity.

Media contact: Hermann Pretorius IRR Head of Strategic Communications Tel: 079 875 4290 Email: hermann@irr.org.za

Media enquiries: Michael Morris Tel: 066 302 1968 Email: michael@irr.org.za