SA urgently needs artisans

Source: City Press, 08/05/2023

South African matriculants must qualify as artisans to meet the country’s economic needs for new infrastructure, maintenance and the switch to green energy.
According to the latest quarterly publication of Remchannel, a company that, among other things, conducts salary surveys, there is already an acute shortage of young artisans in the country. A poll conducted among 565 participants showed that, among those aged 25 and under, only 0.6% were qualified artisans. In the 25 to 30 age group, the figure was 26.7%, and was 40.7% for those aged between 36 and 55.
René Richter, managing director of Remchannel, told City Press that the fact that so few young people qualified as artisans portended problems, as it meant the pipeline of new people to replace older artisans was inadequate.
Higher Education, Science and Innovation Minister Blade Nzimande said as long ago as 2014 that government wanted to ensure that at least 30 000 new artisans qualified every year. However, information City Press received from an insider showed that the target is far from being met.
The number of students who eventually completed an artisanship at technical and vocational education and training (TVET) colleges is broken down as follows:21 151 in 2017/18; 19 627 in 2018/19; 24 050 in 2019/20; 15 106 in 2020/21; and 19 536 in 2021/22.
The figures also showed that the number of students registering at TVET colleges had fallen significantly, from 32 233 in 2017/18 to just 14 379 in 2021/22.
Remchannel said that, although there were efforts to get young people to learn trades, not enough were doing so.
“On the one hand, there are very few young people [younger than 25] who’re qualified artisans and, on the other side of the scale, there are tradesmen aged 61 and older who’re still permanently employed by companies,” said Emily Zuccarini, key account manager at Remchannel.
Richter said that, from an infrastructural development point of view, there was a huge skills gap.
The stigma attached to technical education â€` when it was perceived as inferior to a university education â€` had persisted, said Richter, adding that not enough was being done to change that perception.
In the 1980s, artisans were paid less than academics or professionals, but this had changed dramatically:
It’s a case of supply and demand. Now that there’s such a shortage of qualified artisans, their salaries have improved.
Richter said the five major auditing companies in South Africa all had programmes to recruit students and thus ensure a pipeline of new auditors for the future.
Companies could do the same with internships, for example: “Look at the old Iscor, which in the past trained young people as artisans.”
Meanwhile, the 2023 Future of Jobs report from the World Economic Forum showed that 83 million jobs would disappear in the next five years, while 69 million new jobs would be created. The report was based on the contributions of 803 international companies across 27 sectors and 45 world economies.
Most new jobs would be created in sectors related to the transition to green energy and technology.
AI, especially so-called “generative” AI that could produce text, images and data (such as ChatGPT), was expected to be able to replace more than 50% of work performance.
By 2027, the automation of work performance was expected to vary between reasoning and decision-making (35%) and data processing (65%).