Pretoria - State Owned Enterprises (SOEs), which should establish themselves as big players on the African continent, must play a role in job creation, Public Enterprises Minister Malusi Gigaba said.
South Africa aims to create five million new jobs by 2020, with 900 000 South Africans having lost their jobs between 2008 and 2009.
Many South African youth are unemployed and the reality is that they lack skills, general capacity and economic opportunities in order to participate in the economy.
"This means that there is a need to move beyond mere talk and embark on specific youth-targeted interventions that can and will make a real dent on the situation of youth and reverse their lack of skills, joblessness and lack of broader economic opportunities. SOEs can and must play a major role in this regard, particularly in relation to skills development," said the minister.
Gigaba was speaking at a public lecture at Wits University on Tuesday.
He said if South Africa is to accelerate its growth, SOE training capabilities need to be leveraged to increase the production of artisans and specialised skills. "Our plan is to increase the output of artisans from SOE training facilities by 60 percent to 6780 students for the coming year."
The department aims to increase output from Transnet from the present enrolment of 500 artisans to 1 500 artisans, while Eskom intends on providing apprenticeship to 10 000 young people (up from 4 500) as well as implement a youth programme to support about 5 000 young people to find employment (up from 200) by 2015.
The minister said the country needs to create an environment where national businesses are supported and incentivized to become globally competitive in a country that faces challenges that include improving the standard of living and transforming the ownership and management profile of the economy to reflect that of the broader South African population.
"In that regard, SOEs are extremely strategic instruments. SOE investment can unleash a unique group of multipliers on the economy if managed correctly," said the minister adding that these entities can contribute to employment growth through the expansion of their direct employment and providing infrastructure that can unlock jobs among others.
Gigaba noted that SOEs are a long way from having world class procurement capabilities. "There is a significant gap between our aspiration and institutional capability of the SOEs to procure complex requirements developmentally," he said, adding that steps are being taken to manage the gap.
"It is critical that South African SOEs begin strategically to establish an African foot-prints strategy with the aim in future to play big on the continent," said Gigaba, adding that there are great opportunities in the transport-logistics, energy, defence, ICT, aviation and other sectors.
"At the present moment, all reports indicate that South Africa is seriously lagging behind all its BRICS partners in this regard and this needs to change," he said.
