Employment: At the interface between social and economic policy - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Public Employment in South Africa: Innovation in the Community Work Programme

Employment: At the interface between social and economic policy • Employment is the critical interface between the social and the economic in society: – The personal impacts of employment/unemployment impact on inclusion and dignity: on families, communities, societies. – The social problems that arise from unemployment – direct and indirect – raise the costs of poverty for the rest of the economy; and can translate into economic instability also. – Few failings in the economy impact as directly on social outcomes (and social costs) as unemployment. • If it is accepted – that being productive is crucial to human well-being and social stability, – that even efficient economies with high rates of growth may not necessarily create employment for everyone who needs it; – And that markets don’t only fail to create employment in times of crisis • Then there’s a need for an instrument to create employment even when markets aren’t doing so; public employment programmes offer such an instrument: • Also at the interface between social and economic policy. • In a context of a global jobs crisis, a key moment for innovation in this area: • With MGNREGA giving new meaning to the right to work – with international significance

The context of unemployment in South Africa • South Africa has a crisis of unemployment; the official rate hovers around 25%, but rises to 37% if discouraged work-seekers are included: – Most of the unemployed are under the age of 35 – 60 % of the unemployed have never been employed – 59 % have been unemployed for longer than a year. – Concern at rising rate of unemployed matriculants (and graduates). • Despite SA’s strong system of unconditional cash transfers, there is no real social protection for the unemployed: – The contributory Unemployment Insurance Fund covers only an average of 2- 3% of the unemployed at any point in time. • The unemployed are dependent on ‘goodwill’ transfers within the household and community. • This means the cost burden of supporting the unemployed falls mainly on poor communities – Exacerbating poverty and inequality. • Yet in the prime of their productive lives.

Public Employment in SA • Since 2002 - a policy commitment to public employment – The Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) • An outcome of tri-partite negotiation. • Focuses on the following sectors: – Infrastructure: increasing labour intensity – Environment – Social sector • Review of its first phase in 2007: Main concerns: – Limits of scale (1 million participants over 5 years) – Participants exiting back into poverty: • because of the structural nature of unemployment.

Rationale for the CWP • The Community Work Programme is a new component of EPWP, approved as part of Phase Two. • An outcome of a strategy process initiated by the Presidency; • This recognised deep structural constraints in the SA economy • These mean that sustainable market-based employment creation will take time: but SA ‘sitting on a time bomb’. • CWP designed to help significantly scale up public employment • And also: to test/demonstrate the scope to adapt the concept of an employment guarantee to SA conditions • Inspired by MGNREGA. • But with innovative and context-specific features of its own.

Current Status • CWP an ant to India’s elephant – (and not an employment guarantee • But rapid growth in SA terms: to just under 100,000 participants between April 2009-2011, at 74 sites. • Strong policy support: Cabinet legkotla, July 2011: CWP mandated to scale up to 1 million participants by 2014/15. • CWP’s target is also to have a site in every municipality in this timeframe – Mainstreaming CWP across the society – Enabling systemic-level impacts instead of project-level impacts. – Creating the institutional architecture for an employment guarantee: if policy processes support that outcome.

Features of CWP • CWP offers regular part-time work - on an ongoing basis 2 days a week = 100 days a year • It is an area-based programme, with a minimum target of 1,000 people per ‘site’ (covering about ¼ of a municipality). • The CWP uses community participation to identify ‘useful work;’ • Conditions of work are covered by the Ministerial Determination of Working Conditions in EPWP; The minimum wage is R60 a day ($8.60) or R480 month ($68). • CWP is implemented by non-profit Implementing Agencies • Each site establishes an advisory Reference Group Including ward councilors, local government, and civil society organisations and key community actors (clinic sisters, school principals). • A mandate of the Department of Co-operative Governance since the end of its pilot phase, from April 2010.

Why Part-Time Work? • A response to the structural nature of unemployment: to provide an ongoing employment ‘safety net’ avoid participants ‘exiting back into poverty’. • Regular part-time work – and hence income - provides an earnings ‘floor’; – A small but sustained increase in incomes is more likely to contribute to a sustainable improvement in nutrition, health – lessons from cash transfers. • Enables financial planning, mitigating risks of enterprise activity; • Regular participation in work provides structure, social inclusion • Part-time work enables the economic participation of women. • Income from CWP supplements rather than displacing other livelihood activity – This increases the net contribution in the hands of participants – Optimises the impact of resources from a macro perspective. • Regular income to participants creates a sustained rise in consumption spending – a more sustainable input into the local economy. • Part-time work is unlikely to displace full-time work, regardless of the wage rate, reducing concerns about labour market displacement

The concept of ‘Useful Work’ • In the CWP, participatory community processes are used to identify ‘useful work:’ – 65% labour intensity at site level – Serving the public good, improving quality of life for communities – Absorbing the labour of 1,000 people a week. • The pragmatic assumption is that there is plenty of work to be done in poor communities: but where to begin? • Innovation in community development approaches – the Organisation Workshop – Action learning methodology from Brazil, teaches task management and work organisation skills. • At the start of a site: a process of community mapping: to find out what the needs are.

There are We need a link They need people with We can help to the clinic help to wash, HIV and TB them access prepare food - without social grants – and more This needs support and provide the care also Department There are Maybe for Social orphans Department We can grow Development without of food care Agriculture can help with The training? ambulance Too many We need to can’t get to children are That’s beyond build a road the shacks hungry CWP – can Local Government Girls are help? attacked The youth are We can when they on the streets renovate the fetch water and up to no youth centre, Let’s talk to the good build a park school Organise The school governing body recreation toilets need activities renovating

Integrated development: driven from below • Much of the work identified either requires or benefits from a link to local government, or relevant national departments • This creates a demand-driven pull for relevant services and support: – a new driver of integrated development: from below. • Also offers a new instrument for development delivery, where government departments require a community interface – CWP as a modality of delivery as much as a ‘ programme ’. • Implementation by non-profit agencies, rooted at the local level, is creating new capacities in civil society, and a new role as development partner: allowing local government a supportive and enabling role. • Strengthened participation in local development planning – and new forms of accountability. • A new form of partnership between government, civil society and communities is taking shape: • A vision of a developmental state with ‘active citizens’ (National Planning Commission).

‘ The community work model’s importance lies not only in its scalability, but also in the way social mobilization is made integral to the rollout process, using non-profit agencies to implement the programme and creating new forms of partnership between government, civil society and communities. ‘The type of public employment that the commission advocates is not just income transfer in disguise. It is about inculcating a new mindset that empowers people to contribute to their communities .’ National Planning Commission Draft National Plan, November 2011

So, what work is done? A set of anchor programmes are common at most sites: • Care of many kinds: • Food security: • Youth recreation • Support to schools • Community safety • Minor infrastructure works • Maintenance and clean-up activities • Environmental rehabilitation