Challenges in acquisition of vocational skills for economic development in South Africa : what role can adult education play?

The implementation of Adult Basic Education and Training (ABET) in the North West Province contributes to current shortages of vocational skills and hence economic development in South Africa. Providing ABET learners with relevant learning progarmmes could ameliorate the disadvantages of having a large population which is unskilled, unemployed and unemployable. This paper highlights the failure of ABET implementation in two venues in the North West Province and suggests that such a failure (if generalised) can contribute towards the unemployment crisis, skills shortages, inequality, and slow economic development in South Africa. A qualitative research design was followed in this paper. Two case studies were used in this research. Data was collected in two ABET centres. A total of 25 research participants were purposively sampled. Data were collected using individual interviews, focus group interviews and observations. The paper investigated the relevance of ABET programmes in the acquisition of vocational skills in relation to adult learners' needs. It is concluded that current ABET provision and implementation is failing learners because it does not help them to generate their own employment or find jobs. Instead ABET learning centres are being used primarily as an extension of formal school institutions. Collaboration of ABET learning centres with various government departments and private sectors could lead to the development of different vocational skills and economic development in the North West Province.