Formal TVET, in many cases, fails to deliver skills for existing jobs. The traditional notion underlying both education and training in Sub-Saharan Africa is that employment refers foremost to wage employment. However, as observed in chapter 2, this type of employment has almost entirely col-lapsed. Formal TVET has been slow to respond to the changing needs of the labor market. An example of this is the difficulty that Mozambique has had in retooling its training system from the overly specialized and outdated curricula that were designed for a centrally planned economy and employ-ment in large state-owned companies. The governemploy-ment’s own critique of TVET points to weak relationships with the world of work; the absence of firms in the management of training, particularly the conceptualization and assessment of courses; and the lack of feedback from the world of work (Republic of Mozambique 2001, 3.3).
In Zambia, public training institutions have perpetuated the occupa-tional training curricula and certification schemes developed and intro-duced in the 1960s for a very different economy. The system is characterized by centrally developed curricula and rigid, institution-based training with little or no adaptation to local needs (World Bank 2001, p. 94).
TVET in francophone Africa has suffered from obsolescence, insularity, and improper orientation. The French model was excessively school based and detached from the world of work. This pervasive and inward-looking school model has ignored real labor market conditions. These difficulties orig-inate, at least in part, in the common mold constituted by the French models of the 1960s and 1970s. “Today, while they have mostly disappeared in France, this birthmark is still highly visible in French-speaking Africa, and has been the cause of a great deal of rigidity, slowing the capacity of institutions to respond to economic requirements” (Atchoarena and Delluc 2001, p. 165).
Table 3.1. Secondary Enrollments in Technical-Vocational Subjects
Percent of total enrollments
<2 5–9 >10
Chad Botswana Cameroon
Eritrea Burkina Faso Congo, Dem. Rep. of
Ethiopia Côte d’Ivoire Gabon
Lesotho Mozambique Mali
Malawi Togo
Namibia Uganda
Niger Senegal South Africa
Note: The share of TVE has fallen sharply over the past 15 years. In Cameroon, the proportion declined from 27 percent to 17 percent, and in Gabon from 20 percent to 9 percent. In part, the higher relative costs of TVE were responsible for the declines, in a period of tight public finances.
Source:Atchoarena and Delluc 2001, pp. 36–38.
The curriculum followed the French shift in the early 1970s to a model with less emphasis on vocational subjects. The vocational schools ended up
“poor cousins” to the academic secondary schools, and students used them to prepare for higher education. Vocational preparation was weakened and sacrificed to make more space for academic subjects. France reversed course and added vocational depth to its home institutions later, but this was not done in francophone African countries, which continued with the earlier models. Thus, access to higher education became the tail that wagged the curriculum dog. This was unfortunate, given the low rate of transfer to higher education. The majority did not proceed to higher education and was inadequately prepared with occupational training.
One of the most obvious deficiencies of the TVE systems in francophone countries is their neglect of the informal sector. Modeled on the school sys-tem, they have not taken into account traditional apprenticeship.
Two factors help explain the tendency of TVET institutions to become supply driven: expensive plant and specialized staff. TVET, properly done, requires adequate buildings and often costly equipment. Investment in the necessary facilities and equipment carries with it an inherent tendency toward rigidity. Large and dedicated investments in industrial and con-struction trades, given limited resources, constrain the introduction of new training courses in response to market changes. Managers of training insti-tutions naturally want to use available facilities and may continue training in the same fields year in and year out, without adequate feedback, beyond the absorptive capacity of the market. In addition, specialized training staffs tend to be hired on long-term or permanent contracts and cannot easily teach new trades.
Centrally determined examinations have reinforced the isolation of for-mal TVET from labor market requirements in francophone and anglophone countries. Isolation is not the fault of the examinations themselves, but the exams have become outdated and poorly correlated with market demands.
Most curricula in Mozambique were conceived 20 years ago and are ori-ented nearly exclusively to the modern wage sector, where job growth has been stagnant (Republic of Mozambique 2001). Training for central exami-nations also makes the application of curricula inflexible at the local level. It is difficult to adapt the training content to local labor market needs if those needs are not reflected in the central examination.
Experiences in the World Bank’s Ghana project point to the difficulty of reorienting traditional vocational training institutes to short, competency-based training, especially if they are closely linked to long-established examinations and certificate systems (Johanson 2002, part II, p. 12). In Tan-zania, until recently, the centrally administered trade testing system has not corresponded to the needs of the world of work (Haan 2001, p. 76). In Uganda, adherence to centralized curricula seriously hampers the flexibility of training providers to adjust their courses to developments in the econ-omy and changes in the labor market (Haan 2001, p. 114).
TVET in Zambia similarly tends to be certificate-led instead of employment-led (Haan 2001, p. 122). The central control of curriculum development in Kenya has inhibited a close relationship between industry and vocational training institutes (Haan 2001, p. 51). In South Africa, techni-cal colleges are in a “Catch-22” situation. They seek to be responsive to indus-try but are tied to national curricula that have not evolved with indusindus-try.
Ironically, most employers pay little attention to a prospective employee’s certificates but insist on seeing evidence of competencies and skills.
Tracer studies, where they are available, provide evidence of the ease or difficulty of absorbing TVET graduates into wage employment. Generally, TVET systems lack statistics about the destination of their graduates. Post-training impact is not often tracked through tracer studies. However, some studies do exist. Although some show relatively good employment rates, others indicate major problems of absorption. Of those attending Vocational Education and Training Authority (VETA) training centers in Tanzania in 1996, reportedly only 14 percent found work upon completing their training (Fluitman 2001, p. 13).3In Mali, a tracer study in two regions in 1996 showed that the employment rate of technical school graduates was just 44 percent three years after graduation. In Madagascar, according to a 1997 survey, only 45 percent of the former TVE students had found a stable job a year after leaving the training system in Antananarivo.
The assessment of TVET’s external efficiency depends heavily on the country economic context. Not surprisingly, other studies report better results. A 1990 study of artisan training in Zimbabwe reported very low unemployment (less than 7 percent) among craft apprentice graduates, while another study showed 29 percent unemployment for artisans with school-based training. In Mozambique’s rapidly growing economy, a recent survey showed an 83 percent employment rate in the modern sector for graduates of public VET institutions who sought work (about half the grad-uates continued their studies). Of those employed, about 40 percent were absorbed by the public administration and parastatal organizations. The higher the VET qualifications, the easier it was for graduates to access wage employment (Republic of Mozambique 2003).
In many countries, the civil service has been a major employer of VET graduates. In the mid-1980s, half of all holders of vocational training certifi-cates in Mali were employed by the public sector. An International Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP) tracer study in Eritrea in 1997 showed a 90 percent employment rate among the half of technical school graduates who did not continue their studies. The other half of the graduates proceeded to university with no clear use later for their expensively acquired skills (World Bank 2002, p. 53). Moreover, of those terminating their studies and finding employment, 72 percent found work in the public sector. However, the downsizing of public sector employment through structural adjustment has reduced or eliminated public service as a channel for vocational training graduates in many countries.
Equity
Equitable access to skills development, an aspect of social relevance, is a critical problem in much of Sub-Saharan Africa. Gender equity is a particu-lar issue. Young women are seriously underrepresented in technical and vocational education, as in all other subsectors of the education system.
Gender inequality of access to TVET reflects a gender-biased division of labor. Girls who enter TVET tend to choose occupational streams that lead to the jobs typically occupied by women such as hairdressing, secretarial work, health care, hotel work, garment manufacture, and home economics.
Specialties geared to the industrial sector (mechanics, electrical, and civil engineering) are traditionally reserved for young men. Young women make up less than 15 percent of TVE enrollments in Niger, Ethiopia, Uganda, Eritrea, Malawi, and Namibia—countries that have relatively low sec-ondary enrollments in the first place. In other countries, including Benin, Mauritania, Mozambique, Botswana, Chad, and Guinea, the proportion of women in TVET was between 30 and 35 percent. The generally lower levels of educational attainment and literacy, and the lack of access to skills devel-opment restrict women to low-skilled occupations.
Inequity also comes in economic and geographical forms. In Mali, large socioeconomic inequalities exist in access to training. Farmers’ children are highly disadvantaged. Most TVET facilities are also concentrated around the capital. These imbalances in the supply of training favor the modern ter-tiary sector to the detriment of agriculture or the informal sector. Zambia’s past emphasis on training for formal sector employment has excluded many individuals from poor socioeconomic and low educational back-grounds (World Bank 2001, p. 10).
Quality
As defined here, quality is a measure of a system’s effectiveness in meeting its teaching objectives: imparting knowledge and skills to students (figure 3.2b). Throughout the Sub-Saharan Africa region, the quality of TVET has suffered as severe decapitalization has occurred in public training systems.
Budget cuts have curtailed investments, so facilities and equipment have become outdated. The decay in public provision of training is evident in the lack of equipment for information technology courses and automotive workshops in Kenya. It is also evident in the lack of maintenance in other workshops such as plumbing, construction, and carpentry. The National Industrial Vocational Training Center (NIVTC), in the heart of the largest industrial area in Eastern Africa, is a shadow of its former self. The machines in many of the workshops date to the 1970s. There has been no replenishment and little refurbishment (Grierson 2002, pp. 8, 20).
Recurrent budget reductions have affected the qualifications, pay, and motivation of teaching staff (Haan 2001, p. 175; World Bank 2001, p. 8).
Many governments now restrict their financing to staff salaries, leaving
nothing for consumable supplies and maintenance of facilities. This has had disastrous effects on the quality of skills acquired—high-quality skills require workshop equipment, supplies, and practice. Tanzania suffers from a lack of basic equipment, qualified staff, and financial means for effective training delivery (Haan 2001, p. 74). In Uganda, training is mainly theoreti-cal, facilities are largely inadequate, and qualified instructors are lacking (Haan 2001, p. 98). In Mozambique overcrowding is a problem, with 55 trainees per classroom in the first year and adequate workshops and practi-cal facilities in only 20 percent of the public training institutions (Republic of Mozambique 2001, 3.3). Budget reductions make it more difficult to change and upgrade training programs.
The lack of qualified instructors who have experience in enterprises is a chronic failure of most public training systems. In Mozambique most teach-ers have low qualifications and lack company-based experience in the sub-jects they teach. In addition, they are subject to poor working conditions, low salaries, and limited chances for upward mobility. Well-qualified instructors in industrial subjects command a premium in the labor market.
Civil service pay scales are typically insufficient to attract or retain the best instructors. Existing forms of instructor training also leave much to be desired. Instructor training institutions, where they exist, lack a clear man-date and mission. Instructors need firsthand industrial experience but in most cases have had little or no contact with the workplace or with new technologies. Opportunities for industrial experience and work experience in enterprises are rare, as are opportunities for in-service training (in Mada-gascar, Centre de Ressources des Personnels des Etablissements d’Enseigne-ment Technique et Professionnel [CERES] is an exception in this regard).
Such experience is important to compensate for the overly academic train-ing of teachers and to enable them to meet professional requirements in enterprises. Industrial attachments for teaching staff represent an appropri-ate response to this problem.
Inputs Training
Supply side Demand side
Outputs Training objectives
Economic
& social requirements
2. Effectiveness Figure 3.2b. Quality (Effectiveness)
The quality of training can vary sharply within public training systems.
Grading exercises in Zambia and Tanzania have shown that some public institutions do not even meet minimum standards. In Zambia no public institution received the top rating of “1” in an evaluation of training institu-tions, and one public institution was even forced to stop training until it raised its standards. Variations in quality reflect in part the different histo-ries of institutions and variations in previous support they received.
Internal Efficiency
Internal efficiency refers to the relationship of inputs (time and money) and outputs (graduates prepared to fill jobs) (figure 3.2c). The focus on what happens in the training process is described as internal efficiency while the focus on what happens to the outputs of the training process is defined as external efficiency.
The flow of trainees through the training system is an indication of the internal efficiency of the system. In Mozambique, at the basic vocational level, dropouts average 20 percent per year and failures another 30 percent.
Only 22 percent of entrants complete the course in the planned three years.
This is a measure of internal inefficiencies in the system (Republic of Mozambique 2001, 3.3).
TVET does not absorb a major share of spending on education and train-ing in most countries—from 0.5 percent in Ethiopia to 12.7 percent in Gabon. In Mali, where TVE makes up one-third of secondary enrollments, TVE absorbs 10 percent of total education expenditures with less than 3 per-cent of the total number of students. TVET is expensive on a per student basis relative to general secondary education. Ratios of TVE spending per student to that of general secondary education range from 0.8 in Togo to 13.8 in Mozambique. At the high end, Gabon spent $1,820 per TVE student
Inputs Training
Supply side Demand side
Outputs Training objectives
Economic
& social requirements
3. Efficiency (Internal efficiency) Figure 3.2c. Internal Efficiency
in 1992. In Madagascar, vocational training centers cost 60 percent more per student than technical lycées, 4 times more than general lycées, and 18 times more than primary schools.
Smaller class sizes and higher expenditures on equipment and facilities account for the higher unit costs of TVET, but underutilization also con-tributes. In Madagascar, high unit costs of vocational centers are explained by the relatively few students and the underutilization of facilities. In Sene-gal, facilities are rarely occupied fully, owing to the intensity of the selection procedures. The mode of training can lead to a high cost structure. Most training tends to be center-based and delivered in long courses with fixed entry points. Ghana and Zambia exemplify this type of training.
Vocational training institutions have maintained their high cost structure in the face of shrinking public budgets for training. As a result, public financing is being gradually reduced to cover only the cost of staff salaries.
Many countries are experiencing alarming dropout rates from vocational training, in part for financial reasons (students’ inability to pay or to con-tinue paying fees). This, in turn, leads to a downward spiral of utilization of installed training capacity (Haan 2001, p. 87). Center-based modes of train-ing, lengthy course duration, and high dropout rates together raise the costs per graduate. Higher costs compel a search for greater efficiency in expendi-tures on TVET.
An official document in Kenya, criticizing TVET, could be a summary of the overall analysis of the state of TVET in Sub-Saharan Africa (see box 3.1).