The Sunday Mail
The debate about unemployment starts right from the rate of unemployment itself and goes as far as time and energy permit. While some believe that it is not less than 80 percent, the Zimbabwe Statistics Agency (ZimStat) dismisses that assumption.
Presenting the 2011 Labour Force Survey, ZimStat director-general Mr Mutasa Dzinotizei said: “We have always had this argument about what is the percentage of people that are employed or unemployed in Zimbabwe. Textbook economists will say 85 percent, but that is not true. If we had a population like that, most people in Zimbabwe would have died.”
ZimStat says the unemployment rate is 11 percent. The Herald editorial comment of December 11, 2013, titled “ZimStat’s unemployment claim misleading,” joined many stakeholders who challenged ZimStat’s low figure.
The Herald argued, “We challenge ZimStat to explain what the 11 percent unemployment rate means at a time when millions of energetic and skilled Zimbabweans have since hanged their diplomas and degrees and started pursuing other things.”
I am inclined to agree with The Herald.
ZimStat, in the survey, said that economically-active people, who constitute the working age group population, are 6,083 million, and that 11 percent of them are unemployed. In other words, what that means is that only 669 214 people are unemployed in Zimbabwe.
In the foreword of the survey, ZimStat said: “The survey provides useful information for formulating policies on employment.”
If Government believed that 669 214 people are unemployed, would it be seeking to create 2,2 million jobs? If Government is supposed to be guided by ZimStat in formulating policy, why didn’t it target creating only 669 214 jobs?
Why would Government be seeking to create jobs for 36 percent of the economically-active population when it is only 11 percent of the economically-active that is in need of jobs? Why would Government want to create jobs that are three times more than the actual number of those who are unemployed? Who will take up the excess 1 530 786 jobs?
The above is a clear demonstration that ZimStat’s unemployment statistics give a wrong impression of the status quo.
Of course, ZimStat is right in its own right. ZimStat defines employed persons as “persons aged 15 years and above who worked for pay, profit or family gain for at least one hour during the reference period or who did not work during that period but had a job or business to go back to.”
Using this definition, even a vendor doing his business illegally is considered to be employed. However, the irony is that when it comes to calculation of GDP, income earned from illegal activities is excluded.
The inclusion of some informal sector jobs in the calculation of the number of those regarded as employed is also not in line with the Decent Work Agenda adopted by the International Labour Organisation in 1999 and fully embraced by African Heads of State and Government in 2004.
Decent work was considered to be productive work where rights are protected, and adequate income is generated with adequate social protection. This is, however, not implying that all informal jobs in Zimbabwe are not decent.
Against the above background, it must be appreciated that unemployment is one of the biggest macro-economic challenges of the day. Government also acknowledged that in a report prepared on the occasion of Zimbabwe’s Trade Policy Review in 2010 when it said: “The high unemployment levels, especially among the youths, remains a major challenge in the development process to support the restoration of economic stability and growth.”
People must be put at the centre of economic development. That is why the case experienced over the past half a decade, where the economy grew by a cumulative 43 percent, albeit with no meaningful jobs created, is regarded by many as unsustainable.
To that end, the Constitution has unequivocally spoken in Section 14(2): “At all times the State and all institutions and agencies of Government at every level must ensure that appropriate and adequate measures are undertaken to create employment for all Zimbabweans, especially women and youths.”
The Constitution further weighs in on the need to prioritise youth employment in Section 20(1)(c), which compels the State to take reasonable measures, including affirmative action programmes, to ensure youths “are afforded opportunities for employment and other avenues to economic empowerment”.
I recall former Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe governor Dr Gideon Gono saying, in a paper titled “Inflation Drivers” in Zimbabwe, and delivered as a supplement to the Monetary Policy Review in 2005: “Within the context of Zimbabwe’s turnaround programme, inflation has been declared the economy’s number one enemy.”
There was every reason for inflation to merit that title then.
It is my strong belief that our general price level – currently at minus 0,08 percent – will this month come out of the red zone to be above zero percent, as the more than US$500 million realised from tobacco revenue spurs aggregate demand.
If it was not for promotions such as the OK Grand Challenge, which saw many local manufacturers reduce prices to increase sales, I believe the June inflation rate would have been much closer to zero than it is.
Our new public enemy number one is unemployment and the sooner we declare it so the better.
Our goal of creating 2,2 million jobs by 2018 is currently being frustrated by the fact that at least 10 companies are closing down every month, as reported by the National Social Security Authority.
However, that does not mean it is impossible.
The first step we need to take is to safeguard the existing jobs by halting further company closures through concrete interventions.
The private sector has to be also encouraged to create jobs through the review of our labour laws.
In India, the new government is reviving a reform that will encourage employers to hire more workers without having to comply with cumbersome labour law requirements.
We are not alone.
Our Government currently has no capacity to create more jobs as it is trying to curtail expenditure overrun. More than 70 percent of the National Budget is going to salaries and Government has largely frozen public service recruitment since 2009.
Every jobseeker is, thus, looking at the private sector.
We, therefore, cannot afford to punish the private sector which is the haven for every jobseeker. We cannot muzzle the ox as it treads out the grain.
The private sector, therefore, needs to be incentivised with proper policy and legal reforms that give it the impetus to optimise job-creation.
Zimbabwe also needs to intensify vocational training programmes that equip learners with skills to create products and services with both national and international demand. The reason why many graduates coming from universities are unemployed is that they have no capacity to create something on their own and have to wait to be employed by the formal sector, which has been shrinking.
Formal sector employment declined from a peak of 1,4 million in 1998 to 594 000 in 2011. Since industrial capacity utilisation has fallen from 57 percent in 2011 to 39 percent last year, it is possible that this number has dropped further.
Many holders of commercial diplomas and degrees are, therefore, just hanging their certificates on the wall.
The situation can be different if we have many graduates with skills to do things on their own; for example, horticulture, clothing technology, hairdressing, brick-laying, welding, candle-making, printing, milling, acting, carpentry, sculpturing, diamond-cutting and polishing, fruit canning, jewellery making, inter alia.
A sculptor can carve his pieces which he can export or exhibit abroad, just as a comedian can have international tours, bringing money back home.
In his presentation to Parliament on February 26, 2014, Youth, Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment Deputy Minister Mathius Tongofa said: “Vocational skills training, entrepreneurship development and mentorship have been identified as key vehicles to achieve sustainable youth economic empowerment.”
This is also in line with the National Economic Employment Policy Framework adopted by Cabinet in 2010, which proposed “innovative, gender-sensitive training and skills development programmes such as apprenticeship programmes, mentorship, business incubators, promoting a culture of entrepreneurship”.
Section 24(c) of the Constitution also says Government must endeavour “to secure vocational guidance and the development of vocational and training programmes”.
The fact that the Kurera/Ukondla Youth Fund has incurred a loan-default ratio of more than 60 percent is clear testimony that youths without vocational skills cannot run successful projects.
Government has indicated that it is targeting to increase enrolment at the existing vocational training centres from the current 7 300 to 50 000 over the next two years and that it is planning to equip the 42 vocational training centres countrywide.
By 2018, Government is targeting to have enrolled 500 000. This is the way to go. These are the fundamentals of the “new economy” we are now living in, as espoused by Minister Chinamasa in his 2014 National Budget, where he also admitted that the “old economy” is dead.
The country’s 14 polytechnic colleges, which had a total enrolment of 16 994 as at February 24, 2014, should also be capacitated to increase enrolment in technical courses.
As long as we continue to have 300 000 school leavers every year, the majority of which would have failed, we cannot successfully address the problem of unemployment without a robust vocational training programme.
The private sector has to fully utilise its potential and opportunities to optimise its operations in terms of production, productivity and competitiveness. There are some companies which are making profits and declaring dividends, despite the biting liquidity crunch.
Wouldn’t it be wise for such companies not to declare dividends for now and use the money to expand operations or loan at concessionary rates to those downstream sectors they have linkages with? We cannot cry for foreign direct investment when we are not innovative enough to fully utilise what we have first.
The baker with surplus funds can still benefit from loaning to a miller, and a miller too can benefit from loaning to a farmer, under arrangements. At the end of the day, the economy will grow and more jobs will be created.
Unemployment must be given the urgency it deserves. It must be crowned the number one public enemy, if not a national disaster.
Because of idleness, many youths are now abusing drugs, involved in crime and violence, young women are risking their health by getting engaged in prostitution out of desperation, some are even taking their own lives, not to mention the fraud cases that are proliferating.
Who will cast the first stone? They just want to survive.
