DURBAN - Although South Africa had a high unemployment rate, technological developments were opening up new areas of employment for the youth especially, the World Economic Forum on Africa 2017 currently being hosted in Durban heard on Wednesday.
Speaking at a session entitled “Unemployed and Unemployable”, Hamilton Ratshefola, country general manager at IBM Corporation SA, said young people did not necessarily need a university education to find employment because there were opportunities in the information technology sector.
The session, which sought to find ways to bridge the gap in youth unemployment, heard that South Africa’s unemployment rate ranked among the worst in the world, according to a 2016 global report.
Data from the International Labour Organisation put the country’s 2016 unemployment rate at 26.7%, among the bottom 10 countries in the world.
Ratshefola said high school and university students were not ready for new technology.
“Our biggest challenge is that we have new technology which requires the relevant form of training.
“Digitally-skilled people are lacking and we don’t train enough in the right positions. If grades 10 to 12 pupils can be trained on Java or other computer programs, they can get employment,” he said.
When an audience member argued that technology would mean the loss of jobs, Ratshefola said such thinking was misplaced.
“More technology means new jobs, and I therefore beg to differ with that thinking. We support young people in the African continent by empowering them with computer skills, and we have also sourced work from overseas with a group we took in having learnt different languages to perform the job at hand,” he said.
Minister in the Presidency Jeff Radebe said the responsibility to give life to the fourth industrial revolution rested with continental, regional and domestic communities.
He said there was a need to ensure adequate investment in the development of the continent’s young people.
“Development (at the global level) sits at the apex of our efforts to improve the lives of our people and especially our youth. The extent to which we are able to transform education and skills development, health and well-being, empowerment as well as employment and entrepreneurship would lie at the heart of this march towards progress,” he said.
Radebe added that with about a third of the population between the ages of 10 and 24, Africa had the youngest population worldwide and “to leverage this, investing in talent, closing the skills gap and creating jobs will be critical for Africa’s future”.
Radebe concurred that advancing digital fluency and other key skills was vital to addressing youth unemployment, adding that skilled and unskilled workers should be trained in anticipation of the emergence of the fourth industrial revolution.
In Africa, 70% of employers report inadequate skills at the time of recruiting, he said, adding that it was decided at the WEF on Africa in Kigali last year that the focus should be on future-oriented science, technology, engineering, ICT skills and mathematics, all critical to continental development.
Radebe said Africa’s future remained bright. He called on the private sector to expand internships and on-the-job training.
Both the government and business could do more to make their skills development efforts more effective, said Dumile Cele, chief executive of the Durban Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
“Investment in skills and talent management has become a critical business priority in Africa as well as the world. Globalisation and technology have transformed and continue to transform the world of work,” she said.
Cele said Africa desperately needed to close the skills gap accelerated by globalisation and technological advancements.
Sandi Crowther, owner of a recruitment agency in Durban, said the education system was not realistic about what school leavers needed to get a job.
“Young job-seekers also need to know that they have to go into a job at entry level. They can’t just expect a senior position because they have been to university,” she said.
Crowther confirmed that there was a shortage of skills in most sectors, especially the technical field.
Cosatu president S’dumo Dlamini said at the conference that “the powers that be” should be able to explain Africa’s poor state while they got rich on the continent’s mineral resources.
“Our youth, some with university degrees, are unemployed.
“This WEF should also explain to us what radical economic transformation means.
“We are also not ready for the fourth industrial revolution. We have to deliberate on skilling and re-skilling our youth,” Dlamini said.