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View the Western Cape Provincial AMTS presentation shown at the implementation launch on
24 November
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Western Cape Proincial AMTS published - 16 November 2005
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Western Cape

The Western Cape manufacturing sector is facing an increasing loss of thousands of jobs and the associated problems of unemployment and poverty. If the sector is to compete on the basis of low cost, then it would have to reduce wage levels to be on a par low labour cost countries such as China, or huge government subsidies would be required, neither course of action being politically and economically feasible.

The alternative approach would be to develop new jobs in higher value-added, knowledgeintensive areas of manufacturing, a strategy adopted by numerous other countries affected by the migration of capital and manufacturing plant to low cost countries.
With current high unemployment levels, the widespread loss of jobs (whether low or high skills) cannot be tolerated, especially in the light of the racial inequalities created by the legacy of apartheid. Manufacturing industries that are large employers of people with low and medium skills (such as clothing and food) will therefore continue to be important contributors to the economy, even as they create more highly skilled jobs through adopting new technologies and moving towards more high value added, specialised products.

Leading regional economies establish competitive advantage through their competences and core capabilities. Therefore, if the Western Cape can reinvent its manufacturing industries to generate, retain and attract the best talent of knowledge workers, which are mobile and professional, then the route to a high skills economy can become a reality in the longer term.

The province should avoid being locked in the low skills manufacturing profile reflective of its traditional industries. In order to move out of this impasse, new incentives for HRD and educational and skills training programmes need to be developed that will secure a commitment from employers to move towards a high skills development strategy for the Province. The Provincial AMTS (PAMTS) hopes, inter alia, to create opportunities for such a shift in the balance of employment opportunities.

Western Cape MEDS
The Western Cape government, through its Provincial Growth and Development Summit agreement, envisions a thriving, free and deracialised society that will also catapult the provincial economy as a growing, sustainable, labour-absorbing and globally competitive economy by 2030.

It is currently developing and refining a Micro Economic Development Strategy (MEDS), which is a critical pillar of the vision of iKapa Elihlumayo. MEDS aims to provide a firm platform and strategic framework for launching coordinated, meaningful and cost-efficient interventions in the economy by all social partners. It is an iterative, holistic process that will ensure that :

Interventions that arise from the MEDS fall into two categories:

A key challenge is to create higher growth opportunities which is labour absorbing and covers both the unskilled and higher skilled segments of society. International competition is a continuous and demanding process requiring industry to continually recreate itself and innovate around best global practices.

The Western Cape PAMTS
In line with the national AMTS, the PAMTS was developed with a focus on carefully selected industry sectors and technology focus areas.

The Western Cape economy is characterised by a diverse range of manufacturing sectors and sub sectors characterised by a complex mix of large firms and SMEs. There is also a wide spread of activities from low cost / low value producers to high quality / high value producers.

In prioritising industry selection for a technology strategy, key consideration was given to the Growth and Development Summit outcomes that identified priority sectors for critical intervention. In addition, consideration was also given to industry structure environments such as industry concentration or fragmentation of industry and exposure to international competition (global industries).

Such considerations resulted in the selection of the following five sectors as the initial focus of the PAMTS:

This group of sectors represents a balance of labour and technology intensive activities, as well as different levels of industry maturity and cohesiveness. With respect to the latter, it was recognised that the Electronics and Food sectors are broader in scope and more difficult to define than the others. These two sectors are consequently not as cohesive it terms of the level of industry co-operation and strategic alignment.

It is important to note that the five sectors listed above are not exclusively targeted for attention at the expense of other sectors and in time, the intention is to target other manufacturing sectors that offer potential to be major contributors to gross regional product in the Western Cape.

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