Our renewed sense of optimism can take us far in realising the goals of the NDP
WEF will help us close the skills gap for fourth industrial revolution
● In South Africa there is a palpable and renewed sense of optimism, most certainly after Goldman Sachs named the country 2018’s best emerging market at the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland, last month.
The conclusions at the ANC’s national elective conference brought much-needed hope, optimism and a renewal of great significance.
We can now proudly proclaim that we have a new leadership that has been chosen with the mandate to unify the country, create political certainty and take South Africa forward to a point envisaged in the National Development Plan, Vision 2030, where opportunity is determined not by birth but by ability, education and hard work.
We must concede that as a nation that is part of the global village, we face a growing number of systemic challenges. These include fractures and failures that affect environmental, economic, technological and institutional systems on which our very future is anchored. Part of our response to the enjoyment of unprecedented technological, scientific and financial freedoms and advancement is to chart a more sustainable, equitable and inclusive pathway to a better planet.
Despite global challenges, the South African economy has begun to show signs of recovery and resilience. GDP grew by 2% quarter on quarter in the third quarter of 2017, from an upwardly revised 2.8% in the second quarter.
The agricultural sector was the largest contributor, with growth accelerating by 44.2% and contributing 0.9 percentage points to quarteron-quarter GDP growth. Manufacturing was up 4.3% quarter on quarter in the third quarter and contributed a further 0.5 percentage points. Growth in the sector was mainly driven by rising production in export-oriented sectors such as petroleum, chemical products, rubber and plastic products, metal and steel.
Our most important and immediate tasks are to decisively address job creation, inclusivity and prosperity. We have to work together to ensure there is an inclusive, full-blown economic recovery, for neither the government nor the private sector can do it alone — it calls for a social compact of extraordinary proportions.
A big feature at WEF 2018 was the “fourth industrial revolution” — the current age of rapid, simultaneous and systemic transformations driven by advances in science and technology, which are reshaping industries, blurring geographical boundaries, challenging regulatory frameworks, and even redefining what it means to be a human.
The fourth industrial revolution is unfolding at tremendous speed. Traditional ways of shaping policy, writing regulations and setting standards are too slow, too top-down and too backwardlooking — considering what worked before or not and what the future will look like. We require an approach that is much faster, more agile, more experimental and more iterative.
One of the biggest impacts of the revolution will be felt by the labour market. The increasing technological invasion will lead to a large tranche of job losses, especially low-skilled jobs. There will be a high demand for high-skilled jobs.
The value of science as an educational subject is of critical import. We have a collective responsibility to ensure we develop a community of young people who can believe there is a future for them and, indeed, in the sciences in South Africa and on the continent. Young people have to see themselves as transformative agents of development.
We have to find the means and pathways to get to a better score that reflects an upward trajectory, in line with the world average. We received the grim news that South Africa was ranked last out of 50 countries in a 2016 study of Grade 4 reading that highlighted with some precision how the education system is not advancing the cause of our children.
In September, South Africa, in collaboration with the WEF, agreed to launch a task force for “closing the skills gap in South Africa”. It will bring together leaders from business, government, civil society, and the education and training sectors to accelerate the future-proofing of education and training systems.
One of the objectives is to ensure that talent is developed and deployed for maximum benefit to our domestic economy and society. The task force will help accelerate existing initiatives and improve co-ordination between the public and private sectors.
It is the first country-led, public-private collaboration of the WEF’s Closing the Skills Gap project and serves as a platform to focus fragmented actions into one overarching mission to address future-oriented skills development. It simultaneously supports constructive publicprivate collaboration on urgent and fundamental reform of education systems and labour policies to prepare workforces for future jobs.
In achieving the objectives of the broader developmental framework, education has been identified as being a central component due to the role it plays in building an inclusive society.
This is in line with the prescripts of the NDP, which emphasises that the quality of education is in dire need of improvement. Chapter 9 of the NDP builds on the vision for education, training and innovation, and offers a long-term perspective on how to address the internal obstacles that constrain its delivery.
The South African government has acknowledged the need for a more inclusive and transparent stakeholder engagement on the education agenda. Having acknowledged the shortcomings of the education sector and made a public commitment to its reform, what now remains to be seen is whether the government can successfully implement the progressive policies recommended by the NDP.