Green shoots: Oh, the places you’ll go!

I was eavesdropping on a conversation on a plane heading to Harare earlier this week. As we disembarked, I had no choice but to listen in on a couple, clearly returning home for a visit, and telling their newfound travelling companion about their journey through the world. They had tried living in South Africa, the USA, and Europe. Eventually, they found that Australia offered them the best options for building a life, career and all the things that go with that. 

It reminded me of my early years in Joburg. I was a migrant from a small town in KwaZulu-Natal who came to study at university, and then stayed to seek my fortune. Our social circles were still quite strongly shaped by apartheid demographics, and I mostly hung out with coloured and black people. Many of them were also migrants from KwaZulu-Natal, the Eastern Cape, or the Western Cape - very few were indigenous residents, or “Josters” as we called them. Most of those migrants, myself included, have built careers in this city, started families, and contributed much to the economy of the place through their professional work and spending power. 

There are 2.4 million people aged between 15 and 64 living in South Africa who were born in a different country. This is according to the 2022 census, and I must assume that this figure has increased since.  My brief research reveals that about half of those immigrants have jobs, most of them in Joburg and Cape Town. What the researchers find harder to pinpoint is how many of these jobs are in the professional or specialist realm. One study says that 18% of listed companies have a foreign-born CEO, and about 35% of board directors originate from outside the country. The country has changed a lot since 2022, so we should probably allow for some adjustment to these numbers. 

Too often, the migration story is about poor people competing for the scraps that come from a floundering economy that deepens inequality rather than shares prosperity. Violent xenophobia and the manipulation by nefarious political agendas of community dissatisfaction with the state of affairs are what the cameras and headlines focus on. What is less scrutinised is what happens higher up in the economic hierarchy. I do need to learn more about the debate in South Africa about scarce skills and the argument that we need to make it easier for skilled expatriates to get work permits.

Apparently, South Africa has a critical skills shortage in quite a wide range of sectors, such as Information and Communications Technology (ICT), as well as healthcare, finance, energy, and STEM. What I couldn’t get my head around is that artisans and technicians – builders, plumbers, electricians – are included in this list. But there you have it – there is a significant shortage of qualified and experienced professionals to fill the available positions in the country’s labour market. And if we don’t get these skills into the economy, we’re sunk. If this is the case, I don’t understand why there are so many graduates walking the streets unable to find jobs.

I don’t think we can follow the orange lunacy model and charge $100 000 for the chance to work in South Africa. I do think we need to be intentional about skills development and transfer, and encourage businesses to invest in the skills we do have. Migration is a feature of the modern world and we must embrace the benefits it brings to economies, to culture, to the beauty of humanity that is its diversity. It doesn’t have to be an either-or situation – bringing skills from outside the country should co-exist with the transfer of the skills to young local people who will stay and contribute for a lifetime. 

We should take the words of Dr Seuss to heart and tap into the courage of people who are prepared to leave the familiarity of their birthplace to bring their skills into other communities, much like the couple on the plane.  “You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose… OH! THE PLACES YOU’LL GO! You’ll be on your way up! You’ll be seeing great sights! You’ll join the high flyers who soar to high heights.”