Department of Water and Sanitation kicks off Youth Indaba in Boksburg
Amatola Water Youth attends the National Department of Water and Sanitation Youth Indaba 2022
As part of the National Youth month celebrations, the department of Water and Sanitation hosted its annual Youth indaba, where Amatola Water Youth was invited to participate.
The indaba started on Tuesday, 21 and ended on Thursday, 23 June 2022 at Birchwood Hotel in Boksburg Gauteng. The event was mainly focused on Youth Empowerment, Skills
Development, Economic Transformation, Entrepreneurship, and Job Creation for youth in the water Sector.
The delegates at the indaba included Youth within the Sector, Young Professionals, Youth Owned Businesses, Water Boards, Non-Governmental Organisations, DWS Provincial
Offices, Government Officials from other Governments Departments, , Energy and Water Sector Education Training Authority (EWSETA), National Youth Development Agency (NYDA),BBBEE Commission and many more.
Representing Amatola Water were Mr, Siviwe Rangana, Ms Zodidi Mzimeli, Mr Bayanda Mda and Mr Mthetheleli Ndololwana. The Indaba was aimed at educating young people about their role in the water and sanitation sector and also to highlight available opportunities in the water and sanitation sector and how to access them.
During the deliberations on the first day of the Youth Indaba, five pillars such as Quality Education, Skills Development, Economic Transformation, Entrepreneurship, Job Creation,
Social cohesion and Nation-building were the main focal points. Organisations such as NYDA, EWSETA informed the youth about the services that they provide and also advised
on many aspects to capacitate young people. Susan Andrews, a programme coordinator for scientific discipline at DWS Learning Academy urged the youth to consider studying technical courses in order to fill the skills gap within water and sanitation sector.
“We are faced with a grave shortage of critical scarce skills in engineering and science, our department’s human capital is aging, a lot of scientists and engineers are approaching their retirement time, we need to develop capable workforce and the youth needs to step up. I would also like to plead with recently qualified engineers and scientists to apply for advertised positions within the department”, Andrews stated.
The EWSETA CEO, Mpho Mookapele, encouraged the youth to be the global contenders and make sure that they read matters of importance in their careers. She highlighted that there are careers that will soon not be needed because of the growing technology.
She urged the youth to be on the lookout and be able to change to the viable careers not forgetting to mention the fact that, the openness to opportunities comes through studying the new trends. She further told them that they have a critical role to play in South Africa’s GDP and to the future sustainability of the energy and water of this country. Ms Mookapele sternly voiced that the youth is tired of talking, it’s time for implementation. “We are tired of talking, let’s implement. This year is a year of progress”, she said.
Delegates appreciated and recognized the full worth of hosting an indaba focused on young people who are faced with a number of challenges including but not limited to rapidly growing unemployment rate and funding for their businesses to mention a few. The department committed to conduct a virtual follow-up session to address some of the concerns raised by the youth in the discussions.
Amatola Water was pleased to learn from other water boards and also to get to understand the challenges faced by other water boards. In essence skills development was mentioned several times as key to the solution of the youth.
