The South African skills development strategy: a new and flexible approach towards an integrated education and training system

The election of the first democratic government in 1994 produced great social changes in South Africa. The new government introduced new inclusive policies and legislation and created new institutions, including new labour laws, the desegration of educational institutions, the development of a single integrated national qualification system and the introduction of industry supply side measures and regional strategic development initiatives. This paper describes the re-engineering of the South African education and training system towards an outcome-based approach, reviews the development of a National Qualifications Framework (NQF), and looks at the proposed education and training quality assurance system. The skills development strategy (SDS) initiative is described, including the development of Sector Education Training Authorities (SETAs). The role of the National Skills Fund (NSF) within the national skills development strategy is identified. The authors concludes that the SDS aims to spearhead a skills revolution in South Africa, the success of which will be measured in terms of the contribution of rising skills to productivity and employment growth, rising incomes and improved quality of life. They suggest that the success of the SDS is fundamentally dependent on the partnership between the public and private sectors.

The collected volume of these papers may be found at TD/TNC 65.80; selected papers are indexed from TD/TNC 65.81 to TD/TNC 65.94. Show less