Four factors are expected to account for variation across companies and sec-tors in the amount and types of training:
1. Company size is positively correlated with amounts of training given to workers (smaller companies train a smaller proportion of the work force than larger employers).
2. Employers are more likely to train workers in skilled occupations where the capital per worker is high, along with the cost of mistakes.
3. The amount and quality of the workers’ prior education encourage training by increasing the ability of the worker to acquire new skills.
4. The amount a company invests in new technologies correlates directly with amounts invested in training, as does the extent to which the company serves export markets, where providing quality and meeting product standards are important to consumers.
One might expect that the obstacles to in-firm training would be higher in Africa than in other regions: the prevalence of small enterprises and the high population of uneducated and unskilled workers would reduce incen-tives for enterprise-based training. If this context were accurate, the level of training required could be higher than in other regions but prove too costly for African companies. In fact, the pattern and determinants of enterprise training across companies, sectors, and types of workers turn out to be
much the same in Africa as in other regions.2Moreover, African companies appear willing to expend substantial resources on training their workers.
Overall Training Incidence within Enterprises
Enterprise training is widespread and substantial in Africa. Virtually every company puts shop-floor employees through some kind of training. Most companies engage in ongoing or continuous training. The DNR study found that the extent of both formal and informal training is significant. Formal training means organized training that takes the trainee off the job site and is delivered mainly in classrooms. This training is often general in nature, not specific to the firm. Informal training means training that is in the workplace and is not delivered as part of a formal training program.
Figures 5.1 and 5.2 show the extent of formal and informal training in African enterprises, with informal training accounting for the major share of training offered by enterprises in the sample. This finding matches that of Tan and Batra (1995) in a sample of five non-African developing countries.
Percentage of firms
Kenya Zimbabwe Zambia
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
31.5 56.8
30.0
13.5 44.1
13.2
17.2 40.0
8.3
29.6 50.0
26.7
Metal Wood
Textiles Food
Source:Dabalen, Nielsen, and Rosholm 2002, table 4.
Figure 5.1. Incidence of Formal Training by Industry: Kenya, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, 1995
Training varies by sector for both formal and informal training, reflecting a mix of factors, but it is generally substantial in the firms surveyed.
More than 60 percent of firms in Kenya, Zambia, and Zimbabwe pro-vided informal training. In Zimbabwe, this figure rose to 90 percent of firms.
Informal training is typically targeted at new employees. In Zambia, a new employee received about 4 times as much informal training as the average worker, while for Kenya, a new employee receives 10 times as much.
Equally significant is the finding that one out of five firms in Kenya and Zambia and nearly one out of two in Zimbabwe provide formal training.
Formal training is more likely to be provided outside the firm than in house (Dabalen, Nielsen, and Rosholm 2002). It is also an indicator of firms’ will-ingness to offer general skills training.
International Comparisons
The surveyed African firms compared favorably with several middle-income and semi-industrial countries in Asia and Latin America (Biggs, Figure 5.2. Incidence of Informal Training by Industry: Kenya, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, 1995
Percentage of firms
Kenya Zimbabwe Zambia
0 20 40 60 80 100
Metal Wood
Textiles Food
57.4 95.5
72.0
46.2 89.3
45.3
62.1 88.0
62.5
83.3 94.1
73.3
Source: Dabalen, Nielsen, and Rosholm 2002.
Shah, and Srivastava 1995a, p. 90; Tan and Batra 1995, pp. 5–7; see also fig-ure 5.3). The surveyed African manufacturing firms fell within the range of international experience. Both formal and informal training are comparable with such training in the selected East Asian and Latin American countries.
The incidence of informal training in the African firms even exceeds the comparators.
The pattern and determinants of enterprise training turn out to be much the same in Africa as in other parts of the world in terms of firm size, own-ership, and categories of workers trained. Provision of formal and informal training is undertaken by enterprises of different sizes, from different sec-tors, and of diverse ownership.
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
75.9
49.6 83.1
34.7 62.4
22.9
18.9
10.8 62.8
19.4 91.4
42.6 Percentage of firms training
Zimbabwe Zambia
Mexico Malaysia
Kenya Indonesia
Colombia
% Informal training % Formal training Figure 5.3. International Comparison of Incidence of Informal and Formal Training: Selected Countries
Note: 1992 for Colombia, Indonesia, and Mexico; 1994 for Malaysia; 1995 for African countries.
Sources: Biggs, Shah, and Srivastava 1995a, table 4.14, for non-African countries; Dabalen, Nielsen, and Rosholm 2002, table 2, for African countries.
Firm Size
Large firms, measured by employment, show more willingness to train than do small employers (figures 5.4 and 5.5). Larger firms do more informal training and formal training than do the smaller firms. The pattern is most pronounced in formal training, where small firms do not provide much for-mal training to their workers.
In all countries, larger companies with higher skill ratios for workers are more likely to train than are smaller companies with unskilled workers.
Because of economies of scale, larger companies can afford to engage in more training, particularly formal training. Workers in larger companies are also known to be more productive (Idson and Oi 1999). Zimbabwe, with a more elaborate vocational training system, has higher average enterprise training. Companies and workers there usually take advantage of the exist-ing trainexist-ing infrastructure (Biggs, Shah, and Srivastava 1995a, pp. 208–9).
Percentage of firms
Kenya Zimbabwe Zambia
0 20 40 60 80 100
151+
51 to 151 11 to 50
Number of employees 1 to 10
47.0 95.5
36.7
55.6 81.3
72.7
82.6
88.1 89.7 92.3 95.7 90.9 Figure 5.4. African Enterprises Providing Informal Training by Firm Size, 1995
Source: Dabalen, Nielsen, and Rosholm 2002, table 4.
Firm Ownership
Foreign-owned enterprises proved to be active trainers. This finding reflects one of the advantages of foreign direct investment with the transfer of tech-nology and investment in the skills of the work force. Foreign ownership is particularly striking in formal training (figures 5.6 and 5.7).
Export-Oriented Firms
Exporters are also more likely to train than nonexporters (figure 5.8). A prob-able explanation is that exporting firms face stiffer competition in the inter-national market which stimulates interest in enhanced productivity through staff training.
Training by Occupation
White-collar and skilled occupations tend to receive more training than do the less skilled occupations. Correlated with this finding, educated workers Figure 5.5. African Enterprises Providing Formal Training by Firm Size, 1995
Source: Dabalen, Nielsen, and Rosholm 2002, table 4.
Percentage of firms
Domestic Joint Foreign
0 20 40 60 80 100
151+
51 to 151 11 to 50
Number of employees 1 to 10
7.2 4.6 3.8
11.1 34.4
12.1
34.8
47.6 44.8
80.8 81.2
63.6
0
20 16.1 38.9
46.2
38.5 72.0
84.6
18.6 45.5 40 36.6
60 80 100
Percentage of firms
Zambia Zimbabwe
Kenya
Domestic Joint Foreign
0 20
59.9
77.8 76.9
91.1 92.0 84.6
62.9 90.0
100.0
40 60 80 100
Percentage of firms
Zambia Zimbabwe
Kenya
Domestic Joint Foreign Ownership, 1995
Source: Dabalen, Nielsen, and Rosholm 2002, table 4.
Figure 5.7. Percentage of African Firms Providing Informal Training by Ownership, 1995
Source: Dabalen, Nielsen, and Rosholm 2002, table 4.
117
0 10 20 30 40
Percentage of full sample
18
8
38
31
Exporters Nonexporters
Internal External
Figure 5.8. Informal and External Training by Exporting and Nonexporting Firms
Source: Biggs, Shah, and Srivastava 1995a, table 4.20.
receive more training than do less educated workers. This tendency is par-ticularly evident in Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, and Zimbabwe. The more detailed questions asked of Kenyan and Zambian workers show that workers with higher levels of education are more likely to participate in formal training, while less educated workers are more likely to receive training through informal means such as instruction by supervisors and learning by doing.
These findings match those of Altonji and Spletzer (1991) for a sample of U.S. workers.