Manamela was speaking during the launch of the Services Sector Education and Training Authority’s (Services Seta’s) R103-million initiative to train 20,000 young people in e-commerce and the digital economy in partnership with South Africa’s largest online retailer Takealot at the Ekurhuleni West College’s Kathorus campus in Katlehong, Ekurhuleni.
“One of the biggest challenges in ensuring that training leads to employment has been the participation of industry,” he said, while acknowledging that a lot has been done.However, Manamela said the absence of industry actively participating, opening up their doors and hosting students was evident.
“I also want to make a call to industry: open your doors. We want to call on industry to partner with us so that we are able to train skills that industry itself requires,” he urged business.
Manamela continued: “Yes, there are those who are still complaining about the fact that they do not understand government systems and that our systems require a lot of time, a lot of forms to be filled in, so on and so forth”.
He added that the practical things that the government is dealing with is that if it can enter into these types of partnerships with Takealot then it shows that the system works and that industry is willing to come to the party.
Manamela also cautioned against employers being dishonest and abusing participants’ learnerships and other skills development programmes.
“If you say you are going to train someone in engineering, let’s not find them making tea for you. If you want someone to make tea, ask for someone to make tea, there are also learnerships and programmes for that,” Manamela said.
Trade union federation Cosatu’s parliamentary coordinator Matthew Parks told the Mail & Guardian that there was a drastic need for the government and the private sector to work together to tackle the country’s dangerously high 43.8% unemployment rate and more than 60% for young people.
“This needs to include massively ramping up public employment programmes as well as reviving and expanding internship and artisanship programmes in the private sector,” Parks said.He explained that these are key to providing a pathway to permanent employment for the 12 million unemployed.
“Such opportunities, if done correctly, provide participants a salary as well as the experience, skills and confidence necessary to find employment afterwards. It is key that these comply with the national minimum wage as well as other labour laws,” added Parks.
He described unemployment as South Africa’s single greatest crisis.
“(The) government on its own cannot defeat. The private sector must come to the party and play its part,” Parks noted.The Steel and Engineering Industries Federation of Southern Africa (Seifsa), which represents 16 independent employer associations in the metal and engineering industries with a combined membership of over 1,300 companies employing over 170,000, said there is substantial participation by employers in the metals and engineering sector in training and workplace development, something which it also champions.
Zizile Nyawo, Seifsa’s human capital and skills development executive, said the federation’s position was that workplace exposure is fundamental to an effective skills development system.The objective is to build a stronger pipeline from learning, to workplace experience, to productive employment and that the metals and engineering sector needs more young people gaining meaningful workplace exposure, broader employer participation in skills development and a skills system that enables industry to train the workforce of the future, according to Nyawo.
“Education and training must connect young people to real workplaces, practical experience and viable pathways into employment,” she added.
Nyawo explained that the scale of youth unemployment and the economy’s evolving skills requirements mean that workplace-based learning opportunities must be expanded and participation broadened across sectors.
“The ability of employers to expand workplace opportunities is also affected by the effectiveness of the broader skills development system, including programme administration, funding flows, qualification transitions and coordination between employers, Setas and training institutions,” she said.
According to Nyawo, sustainable expansion therefore requires both stronger employer participation and an enabling, responsive skills development system.
She said the government, Setas and education and training institutions, in turn, must ensure that programmes are responsive, efficient and aligned to the skills required by industry.