Training programmes are being devised to spread high-tech skills
Jubie Matlou
Mateli Mpuntsha speaks with confidence when asked about the training challenges facing South Africa’s information system, electronics and the telecommunications technologies’ industry (ISETT).
As chief executive of the industry’s Sector Education and Training Authority (Seta), Mpuntsha is responsible for co-ordinating the skills development programme for the industry’s 142000-strong workforce, from unskilled workers to engineers and other professionals.
In terms of demographic breakdowns, blacks (Africans, Indians and coloureds) constitute 48% of the industry’s workforce. Women make up 31%. Semi-skilled and unskilled workers constitute 49% of the workforce.
For Mpuntsha such a skewed spread of skills needs to be rectified by a well-developed workplace plan. The plan includes developing a profile of companies involved in the sector and other demographics that would serve as “signposts for deficiencies that need to be addressed”.
With the entry of new players such as a third cellphone licensee and a second and third wired telephone service provider, he expects not only much-needed economic growth but a high turnover of personnel and people changing jobs within the industry for better opportunities.
“In such circumstances the transformation of the sector, the imparting of skills to blacks, women and disabled people becomes a priority,” Mpuntsha says.
The indutry also intends to bridge the gap between academia and the needs of the market. This would enable educational institutions to tailor curriculums to the needs of the companies and of the economy. To realise this objective the industry is promoting study programmes between service providers such as Telkom and MTN and universities and technikons.
“The end product would be a qualification that is standard to the requirements of service providers across the board,” Mpuntsha says.
Mpuntsha is sensitive to challenges and developments posed by globalisation increased interaction among countries, economies and people.
He cites the World Trade Organisation and the International Telecommunications Union as forums with an influence on the workplace skills plan.
“By keeping our fingers on the pulse of international developments we are in a position to follow trends and project our plans for the future.”
The expansion and diffusion of information and communication technologies puts the industry in a strategic position to combat unemployment and to prepare the country’s transition from a manufacturing to a service-based economy. The transition would be meaningless unless it yielded spin-offs to address social ills such as unemployment something that has assumed pandemic proportions for South Africa, particularly its younger generation.
“The industry’s priorities go beyond the workplace. There is a need to impart entrepreneurial skills to the annual batch of university and technikon graduates to establish their own companies, to create employment themselves as opposed to the orthodox approach of looking for employment from someone else,” says Mpuntsha.
ISETT is one of the 25 Setas that have replaced the 35 industry training boards. They were established by the Skills Development Act of 1998 to implement the national skills development strategy intended to position South Africa competitively with other developing countries.
In addition to developing workplace skills plans, Setas are also mandated to administer a levy grant system in which employers make a monthly contribution 0,5% of their revenue towards the training of their employees.
All the money is paid to the South African Revenue Services, which in turn distributes 80% to the different Setas and the remaining 20% to the national skills fund.
Employers submit claims to Setas to be reimbursed for costs incurred in training employees.
The process involves four stages:
l A payment to an employer for appointing a skills development facilitator for the company;
l A payment made out when an employer submits a workplace skills plan to a Seta for a financial year;
l A payment made to an employer for costs incurred in training staff during a financial year;
l Payments made to employers for providing training and skills to people outside the company, such as bursaries to students.
For the financial year to April this year, ISETT received R55,4-million from the 2 207 companies registered with it; R11-million was paid back to employers for claims received.