There is a shortfall of a number of scarce skills in South Africa. One of the areas affected the most is the artisan industry.
While government has started to actively encourage young South Africans to choose trade jobs, they’re also filling skills gaps in the trade with professionals from abroad.
This opens up the opportunity to foreigners in a trade to find a job more easily in South Africa.
South Africa has shortfall of about 40 000 qualified artisans
Earlier this month, Jesse Duarte, deputy secretary-general of the ANC, published a piece on iol.co.za about the shortage of skilled artisans in South Africa.
Duarte quoted various stats and figures. However, the number that had seemingly triggered the writing of the article is the shortfall of 40 000 skilled artisans in South Africa.
This shortage, as explained by Duarte, is ‘a key obstable to economic growth, job creation and business expansion’. Rightfully, the South African government is concerned about the shortage of artisans in the country.
The shortfall of artisans creates opportunities for foreigners with the needed scarce skills in South Africa
Clearly not all gaps can filled by local talent alone, so government aims to also attract skills from abroad to meet the South Africa’s needs. It is for this reason the critical skills work visa was legislated in 2014.
Unlike its predecessors, the critical skills work visa has no caps on the number of foreign professionals that can be employed.
It is also differs from existing work visas. The application process was deliberately made simpler by the Department of Home Affairs.
This was done through a decision to not make a job offer a requirement for a critical skills visa application.
True to the nature of South African immigration, however, there has been a hurdle – artisans have to register with the relevant professional body but the requirements aligned with this registration are far from straight forward for many. This has made the critical skills visa application far more difficult for many artisan applicants.
The good news is that Intergate is seeking to clarify the registration process for artisans. Why don’t you sign up for our newsletter to keep up to date with this development?
Find out if your specific artisan trade is needed in South Africa
If you’d like check whether or not your trade is on the South African critical skills list, simply call us.
Our consultants are able to:
- Tell you if your specific artisan trade is one of those needed in South Africa;
- Do an immigration eligibility assessment with you; and
- Explain the way forward.
It is not the end of the road if your trade is not on the critical skills list! You might qualify for another visa. Be sure to ask our consultants for an assessment.
