SAUFT’s Operating Environment
SAUFT operates in a time of enormous challenge in both the Western Cape and the country. Despite continued improvements in job training opportunities and economic growth rates (from 4.3 to 5.0% in the past five years), the WC’s quality of life is being threatened by:
- The in-migration of over 48,000 mostly un-skilled people annually into the WC from other regions stimulating increases in poverty rates, which offset economic growth and place severe pressures on its economy, infrastructure, and ecosystem.
- An overall WC unemployment rate above 18%, a national rate above 26%, and an 18-35 age group rate of 40%, in an increasingly modern technology-dominated economy in which businesses are being compelled to compete in the global marketplace and employees are required to continuously upgrade their employability skills.
- Massive numbers of young people neither in formal education, training, nor jobs – an open invitation to gangsterism and crime.
- The ever-increasing infusion of advanced technologies and global communications in the modern workplace, requiring the continuous up-skilling of employees and heightened training and qualifications for applicants.
- A widening gap between rich and poor, linked strongly to huge differences in education levels across racial lines.
- A major “second economy” of poor women about which little is known, but which could have rich potential for entrepreneurial training and development.
- A reliance on the Basic and FET education systems to develop the social and technical capital necessary for viable careers in the increasingly demanding modern economy.
- A modern business sector that plays a limited role in addressing the huge educational and economic inequalities that currently exist, leaving the bulk of the challenge to various government initiatives.
- A polarization of modern/Western and traditional/African cultural orientations to work, individual achievement, and social relationships that must be bridged if Province is to progress harmoniously.
With government departments and businesses seeking active partnerships with organisations like SAUFT to address these enormous challenges, there appear to be unlimited opportunities for SAUFT to carry out and accomplish its uplifting mission.
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