Since the late 1980s, there has been are clear indications that the push for reform of vocational education and training (VET) provision has increased in Africa, in particular with respect to the decline in donor support for VET and the advent of comprehensive structural adjustment programmes. There is an acute shortage, however, of detailed empirical research on how VET policies and provision have changed during the last decade. Recent research by UK co-ordinated teams in Tanzania and Zimbabwe identifies the main changes in the provision of formal, off-the-job VET by both public and private training institutions in these countries, and analyses the main factors that have influenced policy reforms.

There has long been widespread disenchantment with training provision by government institutions in sub-Saharan Africa. Until the early-mid 1980s, the main criticism of VET was that it was generally poorly related to demands for skills among producers. Not only was VET provision 'overextended'; but it tended to be biased towards particular sectors (central government, parastatals, and manufacturing) and groups (young, urban-based males in high-middle occupations). Typically, public sector training were poorly planned, managed, and resourced resulting in poor quality but high cost provision often with limited skills utilisation among trainees once in employment. In addition, seriously distorted labour markets adversely affected training incentives facing both individuals and enterprises and organisations.

Despite reform of VET being on the agenda since the late 1980s, there is notable lack of information on how VET policies and provision have changed over the last decade. Recent research seeks to address this gap by looking in detail at VET provision since the late 1980s in Tanzania and Zimbabwe. It focused on the extent to which attempts have been made to change VET provision in Tanzania and Zimbabwe from being essentially supply-driven to demand-driven so that it responds more efficiently and effectively to the training needs of individuals, enterprises and other organisations.

Key research findings include:

• Increased institutional autonomy coupled with increased cost recovery have made public sector VET provision more demand-driven in Tanzania.
• In Tanzania donors have been able to exert considerable leverage in VET reform due to the donor dependence of key VET institutions.
• Improved and more intensive training provision in Tanzania's manufacturing sector has resulted in impressive increases in labour productivity.
• By contrast, in Zimbabwe there has been little effort to reform public sector VET which remains heavily supply-driven as a consequence of centralised state control of training resources, the lack of involvement of other key stakeholders, and massive social demand for post-secondary VET.
• In the face of large budget cuts, ministry-based training centres have been unable to maintain training quality and the actual number of trainees has fallen considerably at a significant number of institutions in both countries.
• In both countries a more enabling environment has also resulted in the rapid growth of for-profit private sector training centres.

Policy recommendations include:

• Both countries require further reform in shape of the creation of a properly functioning autonomous national training agency (NTA) which has a comprehensive mandate to facilitate skills development throughout formal and informal sectors, but no direct responsibility for individual training institutions.
• To be truly demand-driven the governance structure of the NTA must be representative of all key stakeholders across the economy to foster ownership among employers and training providers, both public and private.
• Government must also be represented on the NTA to ensure that public resources are properly spent and accounted for, and that the requisite skills are available for sustainable long run growth.
• Accelerating the pace of organisational reform among public sector training institutions is a top priority in both countries - either by selling off training centres to the private sector, creating semi-autonomous public sector training agencies, or through internal restructuring that create incentives to increase efficiency.
• A lot more effort needs to be made to monitor what VET is actually being undertaken and strategic training according to interpretation of labour market signals for specific occupations and skills.
• There is a to establish national qualifications framework (such as the one recently introduced in South Africa) which is based on a unified, flexible system of qualifications that encourages individuals to improve their skills throughout their working lives.

Source(s):
Vocational Education and Training in Tanzania and Zimbabwe in the Context of Economic Reform, Department for International Development (UK), Education Research Series 28 by P. Bennell, et al, 1998

Funded by: DFID, Education Division

id21 Research Highlight: 6 January 2000

Further Information:
Paul Bennell
Freelance Education Consultant, 60 Rugby Place, Brighton, East Sussex, UK

Tel: +44 (0)1273 503259
Fax: +44 (0)1273 503259
Contact the contributor: swainson@bennell.u-net.com

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