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This chapter considers training through the medium of vocational education in the school location, and considers how the formal education system currently impacts on the informal sector, and how in the future it might have greater influence. The 1980s saw a changing perspective towards education in many Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. A realisation developed that education must be more relevant to the modern world of work. Concerns about the lack of articulation between school and work have been a common theme of debates about educational reform in all countries where there has been a substantial amount of youth employment. Traditionally, the concern has been with how the education system could better prepare students for employment. This chapter considers the arguments regarding 'strong' versions of vocational schooling and pre-vocational models, which refers to heavy specialisation in the vocational in quite separate schools and streams, and 'weak' versions of vocational schooling and pre-vocational models, referring to the orientation to the vocational as part of general education. The authors also consider what is a relatively new trend in developing countries, enterprise education which has emerged in OECD countries as a response to specific problems. The authors examine the relevance of this initiative in the very different cultural contexts of the developing world. In addition, they briefly look at some of the key dimensions of education that might have a direct or indirect bearing on self-employment, including career guidance, examinations, teacher attitudes, materials and decentralisation strategies. Some of the areas discussed concern vocational education, arguments against vocationalism, pre-vocational education, education with production, agriculture in schools and enterprise education. This chapter also explores the kinds of structures that need to be in place in national education systems so that reforms that relate to the informal sector can succeed.

This publication is indexed at TD/TNC 62.213. Show less

Enterprise based training has many advantages over preparation either in schools or vocational and technical institutes (VTIs). The authors emphasise that it is clear from the literature that an element of theory training is a further vital ingredient in skill development, and that there is more than one model of best practice. While there have been recent reforms in on-the-job training in many countries, such reforms have taken a variety of paths. This chapter also discusses the more general trend towards the questioning of the role of the state and a stress on the efficiency of market forces. The concern in this chapter is primarily with the informal sector. The authors argue that changes in training practices within the formal sector have had an indirect impact on the models of training which have been generated within the informal sector. When looking at the informal sector, the authors examine existing models of training which have been generated within the informal sector. They also consider attempts, with varying degrees of success, both to intervene in and to mimic such models. Finally, some interventions which attempt to develop appropriate modern models are explored. The authors discuss enterprise based training and the role of the informal sector in several developing countries including Ghana and Uganda.

This publication is indexed at TD/TNC 62.213. Show less

In July 2005, President Mbeki announced the launch of the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative for South Africa (AsgiSA), a new development strategy designed to help the South African state meet the ANC’s 2004 election pledges, namely: halve unemployment; halve poverty; accelerate employment equity; and improve broad-based black economic empowerment. AsgiSA outlines a very different development path from the current orthodoxy of the Millennium Development Goals and Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers in spite of the common commitment to halving poverty. This difference in approach encompasses the education and skills sector, where post-basic provision is given considerable attention. This paper seeks to explore why South Africa has taken this different approach, especially in education and skills development. It examines what the current evidence tells us about the strategy’s likely success. Finally, it briefly considers the implications this case might have for the dominant model of African education and development.

Published abstract reprinted from ‘International journal of educational development’, copyright 2007, with permission from Elsevier. Show less

This chapter contributes to a critical analysis of South Africa's current skills development strategy (indexed at TD/TNC 75.378) and the prospects for successfully upskilling the population. In South Africa, a large proportion of current and future employment will occur in smaller, less formal enterprises. Skill upgrading in the informal economy will need to be a key element of a national skills strategy. The link between skills development and enterprise development strategies will therefore be of significance to South Africa's attempts to reform its skills development pathway. The author investigates whether there is evidence of policy coherence in relation to the issue of skills development for enterprise development. The analysis highlights the extent to which policy incoherence interferes with delivery and the potential to solve these issues.

The volume from which this chapter is taken is indexed at TD/IRD 88.273. Individual chapters are indexed from TD/TNC 82.52 to TD/TNC 82.62. Show less

In many countries a very high proportion of all female employment is absorbed by the informal sector. These informal activities range from subsistence farming, petty trading and hawking, through to wage employment in unregulated small enterprises or home-based contract work for larger formal sector firms, to ownership of small business. In many developing countries there are more women than men in the informal sector. This chapter discusses women and training for the informal sector, highlighting that there has not been sufficient provision of training for women in the informal sector. The authors discuss the inequality of educational opportunity between men and women, and outline some of the many constraints which prevent women from participating in formal education and training, and then in the employment market on equal terms with men. Income generating projects for women within the area of non-formal education are discussed, and findings from a review of the literature on the training needs of women in the informal sector are presented.

This publication is indexed at TD/TNC 62.213. Show less

This chapter looks at training that occurs after schooling, but before work. Since the 1970s, the emphasis by donors on non-formal education (NFE) has subsided and more attention is now being given to school education. The authors analyse some of the scope and potential of NFE, as it has often been targeted at the very disadvantaged groups which populate much of the informal sector. In the latter part of the chapter, the authors consider the role of non-government organisations (NGOs) in providing non-formal education and training for disadvantaged groups. Given the difficulty of systematically surveying what is taking place in this area, the authors focus on three themes that are of particular interest to donors in the current climate: the (cost-) effectiveness of (mostly urban) vocational training institutes (VTIs); the importance of developing alternative modes of provision in the rural areas; and the increasing and varied role of NGOs. Much of the post- and out-of-school training takes place within a national, state-controlled training system and there is limited scope for non-state provision of education, especially in the basic cycle, whereas training is less obviously the preserve of the state. The authors discuss the debate which surrounds the training system and its ability to respond to the needs of both the formal and informal sectors. This chapter also focuses on programs which seek to provide training in rural contexts. Increasingly, such training has become well-integrated into the overall training system, particularly in Latin America.

This publication is indexed at TD/TNC 62.213. Show less

In this paper, [the authors] focus on highly skilled migration from Zimbabwe to the UK, exploring these migrants' social capital sources/structures and content. In doing so, [the authors] pay attention to routes of migration and how they shape migrants' networking capabilities and patterns. [The authors] further take a Bourdieusian perspective and explore the intersection between social capital and cultural capital in the process of migrants' negotiation of employment opportunities, giving closer attention to how the distinctive habitus associated with being highly skilled migrants from Zimbabwe shape migrants' attitudes towards work. By exploring the interplay between external processes and internalised structures, [the authors] bring to the fore the multiple positioning of [these] participants, who [are seen] not as simply depending on social networks, but as complex actors whose negotiation of employability in the UK is shaped by various factors including intersecting aspects of differentiation.

Published abstract. Show less

The Working Group for International Cooperation in Skills Development, launched in 1996, is an informal group of donor agencies and international organisations involved in providing assistance in vocational and technical skills development. The Interlaken meeting of the Working Group took place three days after the International Conference ‘Linking Work, Skills and Knowledge’ (indexed at TD/TNC 69.702) which was convened by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) in collaboration with the Working Group. In anticipation of the discussion of the conference and its production of an ‘Interlaken Declaration’, it was decided to organise the Working Group meeting around the same main theme as the conference, but adapted to the concerns of the Group in the following three ways: (1) it was associated to the specific issues surrounding the work of development cooperation agencies in linking work, skills and knowledge; (2) following on from the Latin American focus of the previous meeting (indexed at TD/IRD 88.331), the discussion also centred on lessons emerging from skills development activities in Africa; and (3) as acknowledged by the Interlaken Declaration, wide-ranging changes in the contexts in which development cooperation in skills development take place raise the importance of the Group considering a move from an emphasis on knowledge sharing to a position that also includes knowledge production. This paper documents the discussions of the Interlaken Meeting. It is presented in six sections: Reflections on the Interlaken Conference; Linking skills, work and knowledge: filling in the gaps?; Trends in development cooperation; Skills development in Africa: lessons from research; Building new knowledge on work and skills; Interlaken and beyond: building the future of the Working Group. Show less

In South Africa the technical college sector has often been characterised by critics as performing poorly in terms of labour market placement of graduates. Three studies were commissioned by the Joint Education Trust (now JET Education Services) and the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) to address the issue of the responsiveness of technical colleges to labour market conditions. This book presents the findings of the three studies. Technical college responsiveness is gauged through a multiple focus on the perceptions of graduates, colleges and employers and local labour conditions. As well, the findings are set in a broader context of technical and vocational education and training (TVET) elsewhere in Africa, in the UK and in Australia.

Individual chapters include: Being responsive: colleges, communities and ‘stakeholders’ / Lorna Unwin; Researching responsiveness / Simon McGrath; Graduate tracer study / Michael Cosser; Employer satisfaction / Botshabelo Maja and Simon McGrath; Local labour environments and FET colleges: three case studies / Azeem Badroodien; Letters from technical college graduates / Michael Cosser; Building college responsiveness in South Africa / Simon McGrath. Show less

Although labour migration is an increasingly important topic for both policy and research internationally, relatively little attention has been paid to the historical contexts of certain labour mobilities and movements particularly those from Commonwealth countries to the United Kingdom (UK) or former colonies. Instead, labour migration movements have increasingly been debated within the framework of globalisation and focused on how governments of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) are wrestling with tensions between their desire to use skilled migration to be on the winning side in the 'global war for talent' and attempts to outflank rising xenophobia.

This chapter is based on a preliminary study of Zimbabwean highly skilled migrants in the UK which explores the employability challenges that they face in the British labour market. Drawing from interviews with 20 participants, from a wide variety of academic and professional backgrounds (e.g. engineering, [information technology] IT, education), [the authors] highlight the consequent obstacles they face, despite their high levels of human and linguistic capital in the UK context; competences that are historically produced and narrativised in the backdrop of colonialism. [The authors] explore how their experiences and struggles are produced in a notion of broken post-colonial relationships and responsibilities. In this case [the authors] consider the consequent direct and indirect discrimination they encounter which manifests itself in, for example, discriminatory immigration rules and procedures, employer bias, and non-recognition of qualifications and skills.

Authors' abstract. Show less