The Sunday Mail
More than 12 000 college graduates have registered with the Government for employment in other countries under the human resource export programme with deployment expected next year.
Unemployed Zimbabweans holding qualifications in social sciences, psychology and nursing represent the bulk of those who have registered for the programme.
The facility, unveiled five months ago, will witness Government secure employment in Africa for the local manpower.
According to Higher and Tertiary Education, Science and Technology Development Deputy Minister Dr Godfrey Gandawa, Zimbabwe will begin sending abroad some of the registered professionals during the first half of 2016.
South Africa, South Sudan, Namibia, Angola and Botswana lead the race for absorbing Zimbabwean professionals after agreeing to labour exportation agreements with Zimbabwe.
Dr Gandawa told The Sunday Mail last week that the labour export policy will be formalised early next year.
The brain circulation model has previously benefited countries like India, which witnessed a large-scale deliberate emigration of engineers during the 1960s, only for them to return in the 1990s as employment prospects improved.
According to the latest Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency report, the country’s unemployment rate stands at 11 percent.
Said Dr Gandawa: “So far 12 000 people have been registered in our database.
“The bulk of those who have registered are based locally followed by professionals based in South Africa and the others are coming in from all over the world.
“We have realised that most of those who are registering are qualified in the areas of social sciences and psychology I think this is because we have less of people qualified in other sciences and besides most of our people with those qualifications are already employed.
“Most of them left the country in search of greener pastures and we believe most them are already in employment.
“We have identified quite a number of countries where we will be sending our people, including South Sudan, Botswana, Namibia, and South Africa.
“These countries need professional lecturers, teachers and in some cases medical professionals like nurses.”
Dr Gandawa said by the first half of 2016 the policy would have been formalised and labour exports will commence.
He added that the country stood to benefit creating employment opportunities for its people who would otherwise be redundant.
“Firstly, we would have created employment for our people who are currently unemployed because of the current nature of our economy.
“The country also stands to benefit from what we call brain circulation where by our professionals who are otherwise idle at the moment will be ready to contribute to economic growth when we finally resuscitate the economy.
“These people will also be sending money to their families contributing to foreign currency remittances and investment.” The Human Resource Export Policy is being developed in collaboration with the Ministry of Labour, Public Service and Social Welfare and the Civil Service Commission.
Under the programme a database that includes all the people who have graduated from the country’s tertiary institutions and those trained abroad since 1980 is being compiled.
Once the policy is in place, Government will then match and individual’s skill and job openings from country’s that would have signed human resource export deals with Zimbabwe.
Government is using the human resource export programme as a means to assist thousands of unemployed and qualified Zimbabweans, while it works out ways of creating employments as espoused under ZimAsset.
Cuba makes money from exporting health staff to other countries, and Zimbabwe is currently hosting some.
Fast developing countries and those emerging from years of unrest in Africa face a massive shortage of skilled labour in professions such as education, engineering, and administration.
Zimbabwean universities churn out more than 10 000 graduates annually while polytechnics, teachers colleges and vocational training institutions produce thousands more.
Zimbabwe has the highest literacy rate in African and its graduates are highly sought after.
