2nd Annual Botswana Job Summit Held

In an endeavour to craft an enabling environment for job creation for Batswana, stakeholders charged with the responsibility of facilitating job creation and those responsible for creating jobs met under one roof. They met at the second Botswana Job Summit which was held from the 10th -11th October, 2016 at Gaborone International Conference Centre under the theme, ‘Maximising job creation through Effective Policy and Strategy Implementation’.  The aim of the Summit was mainly to deliberate on long term sustainable job creation solutions that will curtail the escalating rate of unemployment in Botswana. They convened

The Human Resource Development Council (HRDC) took the lead and partnered with One Source Consulting to host this Summit. The partnership was necessitated by the mandate of the HRDC which seeks to facilitate job creation as such developing Human Resource Development (HRD) Skills Plans. These Skills Plans are intended to solve the challenge of unemployment among other things. The Chief Executive Officer of HRDC, Dr Raphael Dingalo, in his opening remarks further echoed, “HRDC found it fit to partner with OneSource Consulting once more mainly to affirm the Council’s firm support for Government’s number one priority of job-creation, as we have a shared social responsibility to answer to the needs of our people.”

Dr. Dingalo noted that the greatest current challenge in the aftermath of the global financial and economic crisis is coping with the unemployment situation. He added that, the economic crisis has transformed and mutated into a global job crisis involving widespread job losses and increased unemployment.  “The global jobs crisis is compelling us together with policy makers and development actors to examine best practices for growth and job creation,” he said.  He further encouraged the summit organisers to be innovative and explore all possibilities, stating that dialogues are important in a democracy, therefore, more of the discourse surrounding employment is welcome.

Welcoming the Summit participants, One Source Consulting Events and Conference Director, Dr. Mpho Pheko said the Second Botswana Job Summit will enable crystallisation of ideas, energies, aspirations and experiences to the specific cause of job creation. Dr. Pheko pointed out that the second Job Summit has attracted leading experts and thought leaders from all over the world. “We sincerely believe that these collaborations are the most effective way of informing existing policies, programs and strategies and their effective implementation,” she said. 

The assistant Minister of Investment, Trade and Industry, Hon Biggie Butale, officially opening the Summit said, “For all stakeholders including the Government to successfully drive the job creation agenda, adjustments need to be made between policy and implementation levels. This initiative will ascertain positive link between policy and outputs regarding job creation because failure to implement Government plans and projects is really costing the economy”.

Furthermore, Hon Butale said unemployment rates are now at double figures which is socially unsustainable therefore not healthy for the growth of any economy. He said, “We can reduce unemployment if we as a Government hold job creation as one of our most important performance indicators between now and 2019”. The two-day Summit was rich with discussions from experts in different areas including policy formulation, Creative Technology, employment prioritisation, social entrepreneurship and many others.

The Summit also emphasised the existence of sound policies, strategies and programmes in Botswana that are all designed to either eradicate abject poverty, empower the citizens economically, grow the private sector and Small Micro and Medium Enterprises (SMMEs) and diversify the economy or to grow and create jobs. The last session on the order focused primarily on systemising the two - days discussions and agreeing on the resolutions which will serve as inputs into job creation interventions by various stakeholders post the summit. The focus of the two-day discussions was on the Youth and Job Creation.

News Date: 
Monday, October 10, 2016