At the annual general meeting in Johannesburg, AgriSETA board chairperson Sharon Sepeng emphasised the need for agricultural colleges to align their curricula with the needs of the sector and the country.
Sepeng’s comments come hot on the heels of industry role players raising concerns about the state of the colleges. The process to move them to the department of higher education and training is expected to conclude in April next year.
“We are saying as AgriSETA those in the agri sector should assist us, let us try to absorb these young people because we complain about unemployment and skills development, especially among young people.
“We have TVET colleges and I can say today that we shall have an agricultural symposium where the issue of TVET colleges will be looked at more deeper. We are not doing enough as agricultural colleges; there needs to be partnerships with role players in the industry,” she said.
Research and innovation are key
Sepeng called for the alignment of training to what the market needs as that will ensure that the fight against unemployment is dealt with decisively.
She said research and innovation were key in the sector and as they have partnered with different institutions of learning and have seen how important investing in research work was.
“Can we look into who is supposed to do our research? Are they only supposed to be done by universities? How about service providers of AgriSETA start looking at training young people on research skills? The country needs skills and technology to move forward,” she said.
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Sepeng urged agricultural leaders to join their gathering, where they will address the challenges faced by agricultural colleges, particularly the frustrations regarding the skills, knowledge, and competencies of students.
‘Unemployment is everyone’s problem’
Speaking at her last annual general meeting as the board’s term ends in March next year, Sepeng said they are happy to leave the institution in good condition.
“We had achieved no irregular expenditure, no unauthorised expenditure. As the board we are very proud to say we did run our race and our race was very clean and we are leaving the institution on a clean audit,” she said.
Chief executive officer Dr Innocent Shirovha said the institution’s work is echoed by stories of resilience, determination and hope.
“Hope for the future, determined that no matter the situation we are confronted with, we will remain very resilient. A story of people we face daily in our community,” he said.
Sirhova told the annual general meeting that unemployment is everyone’s problem and wants to see people with no skills and who cannot be employed get the necessary skills to get through the employment market.
“Let us work together to change these stories of our people. This is an area in which we think we can work together with stakeholders across all spectrums including municipalities, those are partnerships we think can make a huge difference,” he said.
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