adminSifelani Tsiko in Victoria Falls
Government plans to carry out a nationwide survey to ascertain the skills base in the country which can enable it to deliver its key functions effectively, an official said here yesterday.
National Manpower Advisory Council (NAMACO) chairperson, Commissioner Mrs Tendai Bare told delegates at the on-going Unesco Africa Engineering Week that her organisation and the Ministry of Higher and Tertiary Education, Science and Technology Development were organising a nationwide human resources survey to get a view of the skills that exist in the country.
“What is of concern, however, is that in order to accurately plan for the future, it is imperative to have an accurate picture of the present status,” she said. “So far the information at hand is patchy, scattered and outdated.”
Commissioner Bare said some of the reports were from the National Manpower Survey of the early 80s, the NEPACHEM project, the sadc Engineering Survey, the ZEPARU Mining Skills Audit, the zimstats Labour Force Surveys and lately the Tourism and Hospitality Skills Audit driven by namaco.
“namaco is as keen as anybody else to establish the exact position about the national human capital requirements in the context of realising the Zim-Asset goals,” she said.
“We believe that we may not be able to make it unless we are ready and willing to act as one.”
Government has operated for several years without knowledge of the actual statistics pertaining to sectoral needs making it impossible to identify areas with a shortage of critical skills.
This has affected planning and efforts to determine who is who and what their contribution to Government is.
The country’s education sector accounts for 140 000 civil servants while health workers account for 40 000.
Skills audit analysts say despite this, the country continues to face skills deficit in the health and education sectors as most people have left in search of jobs elsewhere in the region and abroad. namaco believes the survey will ensure Government, companies, investors, individuals as well as education and training providers have ready information concerning the state of strategic skills needed in the country
Commissioner Bare said Zimbabwe faces a critical shortage of engineers as evidenced by the engineer populations ratio of 1:6 500 as opposed to ratios of 1:250 in industrialised countries.
“The dearth of engineers can be traced back to the scarcity of lecturers which in turn, is attributable to the lack of a pool of school leavers who both attempt and pass mathematics and science,” she said.
She hoped the introduction of a new curriculum for schools will help encourage and motivate more students to take up science subjects.
Zimbabwe has 10 state universities and five private ones which churn out about 10 000 graduates who cannot be absorbed into the formal market worsening the country’s unemployment figures.
More than 500 delegates from different parts of the world, including students from across Africa are attending the engineering event here.
The Africa Engineering Week hosted in partnership with Unesco, the World Federation of Engineering Organisations and local engineering bodies aims to educate youths and the general public about engineering through outreach activities such as educational workshops, public awareness events and mentoring activities.
Online Reporter