Corporations, Global Governance and Post-Conflict Reconstruction by Peter Davis

Author:Peter Davis [Davis, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Globalization, Economics, Political Science, Business & Economics, General
ISBN: 9780415617246
Google: HG135lyUri8C
Goodreads: 14870879
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2012-07-23T00:00:00+00:00

Reconstruction tasks: skills development and the creation of a knowledge economy

As the Government itself admits, ‘the severe shortage of professional personnel constitutes an obstacle to the development of all sectors.’54 Most of those interviewed reported very poor skills levels at all but the most senior levels of government, and the development of the private sector is hindered by a lack of competent staff. Speaking of the situation in Government, development agencies reported that the problem is with the middle cadre whose education was most disturbed by the genocide. The result is that, within the government, there are simply not enough good people to get things done: ‘second rank bureaucrats aren't any good’, was a typical remark. The situation is the same in the private sector. According to the Private Sector Federation, 40 per cent of businesses report difficulties recruiting properly-trained staff.55 It is also evident that a lack of key skills is a very real inhibition to the smooth orderly running of businesses. The Private Sector Federation report the following case:

Two large paper manufacturing companies face a particular challenge in developing and employing an adequately skilled technician to manage the repair and upkeep of several of their key machines. Since their longstanding technician was imprisoned they have tried unsuccessfully to train young technical school leavers and to recruit a replacement. But none has been able to master the job and so both companies have resorted to paying for bail to get their old technician out of jail for a day to repair their machinery.56

There does also appear to be a difference of opinion about the availability and relevance of the training available. 57 per cent of PSF members report that a lack of ‘local availability of relevant training’ is a ‘major problem’ for their business.57 Although the Government has invested in skills training, this seems not to be addressing the problem effectively: Watkins and Verma concluded that, ‘although state-sponsored technical and vocational schools have been established … these institutions do not seem to be turning out graduates with the skills required by potential employers.’58

Making Rwanda the ICT hub of the region – ’the Silicon Valley of East and Central Africa’59 – is a central goal of the government. As the World Bank acknowledges, this ambition comes from Kagame himself.60 Yet this goal is also compromised by the lack of a pool of ICT talent on which to build. Rwanda is a beneficiary of the e-schools programme being run as part of the NEPAD e-Africa Commission. The Government has also committed US$1 billion to the construction of a series of ‘Telecentres’ around the country with the aim of ‘bringing rural areas on-line and promoting broader-based use of technology for businesses.’61 At a tertiary level, in 1997 the Government established the Kigali Institute of Science and Technology ‘to address the skills gap in technology.’62 However, although the Institute trains many people, the quality of this education is open to serious question. The 200-odd food science and technology graduates of the Institute have ‘no meaningful practical experience, the subject being taught almost entirely in theory.

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