Clive Charlton, Head of Solution Architecture: Public Sector, Sub-Saharan Africa at AWS

Access to devices, the cost of mobile data and software licensing, and an outdated NQF framework are among the major challenges standing in the way of South Africans upskilling themselves to address the country’s digital skills shortfall.

This emerged during an AWS webinar on skills development and capacity building for a future-proofed workforce, in November.

Evan Jones, Group Strategy Director at the Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator, said: “Our most recent research suggests that right now there are around 66 000 unfilled digital jobs in the country. The university systems are doing fantastic work, producing around 4 000 computer graduates a year, but we need to scale skilling innovation to meet the demand. There is no shortage in the South African fiscus to pay for skills, but a lot of money is being spent inefficiently or on the wrong skills. Some of the accredited programmes in the NQF are outdated, yet companies are spending tremendous amounts of money on them.”

Jones said the answer lay in micro-credentialling, in which candidates achieved vendor certifications and undertook a range of short courses, such as the free training and certification learning paths offered by AWS. “Our research this year shows the number one thing employers value is micro-credentialling, for example, AWS certified engineers, but these micro credentials aren’t being recognised by the government,” he said.

Dr Stanley Mpofu, CIO at the University of Witwatersrand, said the lockdown had highlighted the fact that a remote learning or blended learning model could not succeed unless low income and rural students were given affordable access to high-speed data. “Zero rating or a data subsidy should be introduced to help young people access online education from an early age. We also need to see public-private partnerships targeting children with potential at an early age, and introducing them on a technology journey from primary school.”

Prof Ahmed Bawa, CEO of Universities South Africa, an industry body for 26 universities, said the sudden adoption of remote learning had illustrated that there were deep inequalities in the system. “There has been immense pressure on universities to support students by distributing devices and data. But with 600 000 devices and 40 petabytes of data per month distributed, this is not sustainable,” he said. “It was a massive and constant battle to get reasonable rates.

“We need to focus on creating a digital teaching and learning ecosystem that is available to all South Africans, and try to ensure that a system for lifelong learning becomes possible. We have a completely fragmented skills and education system in which we have split cognitive learning from skills development – we have to bring them back together,” he said.

Clive Charlton, Head of Solution Architecture: Public Sector, Sub-Saharan Africa at AWS, said certain digital skills were in high demand around the world. “According to LinkedIn’s global list of most in demand skills last year featured cloud, AI and analytical reasoning. This year, blockchain, cloud, AI and analytics topped the list. To help address these skills shortfalls, AWS runs a number of initiatives, including our Data Science Academy, the Quantum Leap training investment programme, the AWS Educate programme; and AWS Academy. AWS is focused on expanding cloud skills across Africa, offering training programmes available for online self-paced learning, and we are also working with organisations like GirlCode and GovChat.”