Minister Blade Nzimande: Construction Sector Education and Training Authority Infrastructure Summit

Remarks by the Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation, Dr Blade Nzimande on the occasion of the Construction Sector Education and Training Authority (Ceta) infrastructure summit

Programme Director; Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB) CEO, Mr Cyril Gamede;

Administrator of the Construction SETA, Mr Wasa;

Levy Payers and Key Stakeholders in the Construction Sector;

My Advisors and officials from the Ministry;

Officials from the Department and the Construction SETA;

Distinguished Guests;

Ladies and gentlemen.

Good morning

It is my humble honour to address you today in this important occasion of the Construction Sector Summit for Skills, Jobs and Growth.

I am delighted that the Administrator and the Construction SETA, felt it appropriate to hold this Summit at a critical time as government seeks to mobilise the entire country on an infrastructure-led economic recovery with focused investments in energy, water and sanitation, roads and bridges, human settlements, health and education, digital infrastructure and public transport. The construction sector is an important sector to be prioritised especially for skills development, targeting mainly the youth of our country.

In 2018 there were over 59 000 firms (including building materials firms) registered with the Construction SETA and over 51 513 firms registered with the Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB). This welcome development illustrates huge potential in the construction sector that can help us to transform and build an inclusive economy.

I am gratified by the significant increase in the number of new entrants into the construction sector with the CETA experiencing a 47% annual increase from 2019 to 2020. With these developments I am confident that we will be able to achieve our objective of an inclusive growth path with women, people with disabilities and young people integrated in these developments.

To ensure that this growth is meaningful to our people, it must be a massive job creator and multiplier, with emphasis on using local South African materials and construction companies as well as labour-intensive methods.

Therefore, the role of the CETA is an integral and critical in growing and developing our South African economy.

The Statistician-General on the 8th December 2020 released the results of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the third quarter of 2020, revealing that the South African economy grew by an annualised rate of 66.1% in the third quarter - or 13.5% quarter on quarter.

According to this report, the construction sector grew by 71.1% in the referred quarter compared to contraction by 76.6% (-76.6%) in the second quarter of 2020.

At the same time, in terms of the Quarterly Labour Force Survey, we are starting to see some positives, as employment increased from 1, 066 000 to 1, 080 000, implying an increase by 14 000.

What is also interesting in the work of the CIDB's Construction Monitor, released in October 2020, is that out of all 9 provinces, Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, Western Cape and Eastern Cape collectively contribute 75% of construction work employment, implying most of the construction work takes place in these provinces, with the Northern Cape having the lowest contribution.

As we implement the Economic Reconstruction and Recovery Plan launched by our President Cyril Ramaphosa on the 15th October 2020, we should start to realise increased economic growth and employment in the construction sector.

This can only succeed with your participation and contribution (individually or collectively) as the sector, not only by levy paying employers, but broadly by the sector.

The collective impact of these sectoral interventions is intended to bring South Africa back on course towards the targets set in the National Development Plan, which includes, amongst others, aiming to grow the South African economy at a rate of 5,4%.

The Economic Reconstruction and Recovery Plan as launched by the President acknowledges the extent of the crisis caused by the pandemic. Moreover, it takes into account that the impact of this global pandemic is exacerbated by the context of a decade of a stagnant economy and low levels of investment and growth in South Africa.

This COVID-19 crisis is connected to a wider set of historical crises of social inequality, of climate change, of technological disruption, and linked to all of the above is a global capitalist system crisis.

This COVID-19 epidemic has dominated our minds and hearts in the year 2020 and it seems it will do the same this year. Like many other sectors, it has brought unprecedented challenges for the leadership and management of both our PSET sector and our national system of innovation (NSI).

The extent of these challenges have been recognized by all social partners, resulting in a strong commitment to 'mobilise all our resources and efforts in economic activities that will put the economy in a sustainable recovery trajectory'.

Prior to the devastation brought by COVID 19, the construction sector had also not been in the best of shapes in terms of investment, jobs, growth, inclusivity and skills. The pandemic has only served to deepen the dire straits of a sector already on a down-ward spiral.

Several big and small construction firms have folded or are holding on precariously for survival, with dire consequences for jobs, growth, entrepreneurship and skills development in the sector.

The COVID-19 pandemic has inspired all social actors across South Africa, in government, business, labour and communities into a social compact designed not only to reverse the worse effects of the pandemic on the economy and society, but to overhaul current systems and re-imagine a better post-COVID-19 or post lockdown society. Hence President Ramaphosa well captures the momentum when he said: 'We are determined not merely to return our economy to where it was before the coronavirus, but to forge a new economy in a new global reality'

What we are yearning for, is a construction sector with specific efforts devoted to a common path for recovery and rebuilding the sector in ways that goes beyond the impact of the COVID 19 pandemic. But it must also be a construction sector that will deal with the historical structural and systemic challenges that always characterised the sector, as a preserve of monopolies who are a preserve of whites and male dominated. This character does not belong to a future construction sector that government wants to build.

Accompanying these developments must be the restructuring and repositioning of the Construction Seta (CETA) to play its appropriate role in skills development, to support the revitalisation of the construction industry.

I placed the CETA under administration so we rescue it from the debilitating challenges it was facing. We are also fairly advanced with the forensic investigation to get to the bottom of the problems in the Construction SETA. I appreciate the support being given to this process of revitalising this CETA from most of the stakeholders and industry players. Nothing will detract me from getting to the bottom of the problems in the CETA.

I am happy to have seen in the Construction Industry Development Board's (CIDB) Annual Report of 2019/20, commitments to initiatives to develop high-level construction skills including workplace training opportunities in infrastructure contracts, implementation of the cidb Standard for Developing Skills through Infrastructure Contracts, as well as the WorldSkills project in partnership with our TVET colleges.

The CIDB's partnership with the Department of Higher Education and Training for the absorption of TVET college learners in its TVET expansion programme is reported to have placed 223 learners on three college construction and infrastructure maintenance projects, with more expected in the coming financial year (2021/22).

I am looking forward to the CIDB's Standard for Developing Skills through Infrastructure Contracts to further assist small and medium construction companies by providing workplace training with programmes that result in national accreditations.

By implementing this Standard, around 10% of the labour force on construction sites and in design offices will receive structured workplace skills training annually.

• On public sector contracts, this will result in around:
• R450 million spend on workplace training per year;
• 10 000 learning opportunities per year for further education and training learners/artisans; and
• 1 500 learning opportunities for candidates.

To me, this is what I need to see within the construction sector, turning every workplace into a training space.

My Department of Higher Education and Training is currently developing the Skills Strategy to support the Economic Reconstruction and Recovery Plan. I expect the construction industry and the CETA to play their role in this regard.

Preliminary indications are that with regards to infrastructure investment and delivery, we need occupations such as Construction Project Managers; Civil engineers; Civil Engineering Technologists; Architect; Civil Engineering Technicians; Building Inspectors; Carpenters; Plumbers; Steel Fixers and Electricians.

Concurrently, we need to know how many we are short of and how many are in the training pipeline.

I am aware that the Construction SETA, working with levy paying employers, are in the process of piloting the apprenticeship-based training model, similar to the German dual system. I fully support this, especially within the context of trades as identified in the Centres of Specialisation at TVET colleges and in the Economic Reconstruction and Recovery Plan.

As the Construction SETA opens its window for this model, I want you, as levy payers to respond positively and embrace this initiative as you normally do.

Working with the Construction SETA becomes very critical and urgent for all stakeholders in the sector both small, medium and large, if we are to positively contribute to ERRP's priority intervention of Infrastructure Investment and Delivery.

The CETA is at the inter-section between skills production, the labour market and the economy. For this reason, it is only right that the CETA leads the effort of ensuring that this sectors effort is underpinned by a robust skills revolution through continuous skills development and training to reverse the historical injustices of the past.

In our interventions, we must keep young people engaged as we know that unemployment for young people between the ages of 15 - 24 years old remains very high at 74.1% by the third quarter of 2020, whilst the number of those not in employment, education and/or training (NEET) for the same cohort remains high at 3.2 million.

I remain concerned about the inadequate inclusion of women within the construction sector as women are hugely underrepresented. Out of the total workforce of 1, 080 000 in the sector, women are only 113 000 whilst men are 967 000.

We urgently need to address this clearly unacceptable situation and ensure that the construction sector reflects the demographics of our country.

As we implement the Economic Reconstruction and Recovery Plan, we have an opportunity to address these transformational and development imperatives, as gender equality and economic inclusion of women and youth are identified as priority interventions.

As I conclude, it will be remiss of me, as the Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation not to briefly speak about investigations by the South African genomic scientists, led by the KwaZulu-Natal Research Informatics and Sequencing Programme (KRISP), into the evolutionary characteristics of SARS CoV-2, which resulted in the detection of the new coronavirus variant, dubbed 501Y.V2.

I mention this development so that the construction sector is well abreast of these developments whilst undertaking this important project of implementing ERRP.

One of the entities we fund based at the University of KwaZulu Natal, called KRISP, is the first in the world to uncover such a new variant, showing that the 501Y.V2 variant has a number of mutations, which increases the efficacy of the virus to infect humans and potentially posing problems of vaccine escape.

This work is continuing through the Department of Science and Innovation, and we have allocated KRISP R25 million over the next 12 months to complete the sequencing of 10 000 SARS-CoV-2 genomes in South Africa and the rest of the African continent.

Our scientists continue to work with their international counterparts to ensure that knowledge is pooled in order to bring COVID-19 under control.

The Department of Science and Innovation (DSI) has also funded local clinical trials and facilities to continue to track the evolution/mutation of SARS-CoV-2 lineages.

We do not know how much longer the COVID-19 storm will last or how much worse it will get. But we know what we need to do to weather the storm.

We know what we need to do to protect ourselves and those around us.

We know what we need to do - as a nation, as a continent and as a global community - to overcome this pandemic.

We need to act with a common purpose, understanding that what we each do is important for ourselves, our families, our communities and our society.

Importantly to all of us, especially in this sector, is to continue observing COVID-19 protocols and requirements in construction workplaces, whilst not lowering our commitment to turn the construction industry into a training space.

If we work together and if we maintain our resolve, we will realise a better new year that we all so dearly yearn for. Let me take this opportunity to wish you a successful discussion.

I thank you.