BANKSETA ANNUAL REPORT 2023

PERFORMANCE INFORMATION

Provincial Offices BANKSETA’s regions, covering several of the country’s provinces, continue to provide valuable footprints for the organisation by ensuring that they are visible on the ground. This is particularly the case for BANKSETA’s rural stakeholders. The regional offices monitor and provide support for many of BANKSETA’s projects. The number of learners, both employed and unemployed, bursaries granted, SMMEs funded, and cooperatives and HEI institutions supported in each province are testament to the effectiveness of the outreach of each region. The regions are also contact points for information for learners, instead of them having to call BANKSETA’s head office.

Limpopo region

External challenges in the region focus on the high rate of unemployment, particularly among young people in the rural areas. A major difficulty arises from the fact that so many learners did not do pure mathematics and accounting at school, which makes them difficult to place. The region is delighted that BANKSETA is encouraging learners to be placed in sectors other than banking, to give them the experience they need. Internally, the region continues to be challenged by lack of human resources, especially since the resignation of one of its interns, and hopes that the completion of the occupational design study by the BANKSETA will address some of the shortages. In respect of the future, the region is looking forward to a new way of working for the maths and science project. Instead of partnering with NGOs, the project will in future work with institutions of higher education, such as universities and TVETs, in which academic staff and students in their final year of study will provide the tuition needed for the project.

The Limpopo region covers two provinces – Limpopo and Mpumalanga. The region enjoyed several successes during 2022/23. One such success is that of placing learners in municipalities, particularly rural ones, in areas such as IT and finance. When monitoring visits are done, it is clear that top management of these local government structures regard the learners as valuable assets and are keen for the region to continue placing them. In turn, the learners gain valuable experience and are having doors opened for them. Another project that has done well is the entrepreneurship programme. TVET institutions are encouraged to take the programme to wherever students gather to teach them skills such as how to construct a business plan, market their products, build a website, to name just some of the skills learned and empowering them with knowledge that they did not previously have.

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BANKSETA ANNUAL REPORT 2022/23