Joint Aid Management

Andrew Layman:  PCB CEO

A R50 million investment has been made recently in Mason’s Mill.    The premises that were formerly occupied by Kodak were bought and altered to meet the requirements of an organisation known as JAM.  This acronym stands for Joint Aid Management, a South African-based and initiated non-profit  company that manufactures food for distribution to under-nourished children throughout Africa.   The organisation has been in existence for twenty-seven years since the founder, a man by the name of Peter Pretorius, decided that his missionary work was not enough to deal with the acute problems of starvation in poor parts of the continent.    Now JAM is international in its reach for donors, and the establishment of the manufacturing base in Pietermaritzburg was made possible by a grant from the Helmsley Trust, based in the USA, which is a source of much of JAM’s funding.    At present, the food produced is sufficient to feed about 550 000 children each day.   This figure is expected to rise to a million at least once the local plant becomes fully operational.    The food is an internationally-approved blend of maize and soya beans with the addition of sugar and vitamins.   Although the new plant will provide employment for some sixty people, it is highly mechanised and technologically advanced.   This ensures that the highest standards of food production will be maintained and will also enable the factory to fulfil commercial manufacturing contracts so that it can be financially self-sufficient.

There were several visitors from America at the official opening earlier this week.   They wondered about the people, members of the local community no doubt, waiting on the roadside outside of the factory.   They were there on the off chance that some work might be on offer.    How sad to see such hopeful patience in an environment where jobs are so few and far between.     In fact, we can see many people each day lining streets hoping that someone will come along and employ them, even casually for a day.     In addition to these aspirant workers, there are thousands more who have given up hope of ever earning a wage.    In this deplorable state of affairs, the country has people earning multi-million rand salaries and workers who have jobs demanding what they call a “living” wage.   We also have Black Economic Empowerment activists who are more concerned about the number of black directors, chief executives and shareholders.    

Why is it, I wonder, that so little is actually done to improve our employment position?    By far the majority of people who might be considered economically empowered, in the sense that they are contributors to the economy with buying power, have reached this stage through employment and being paid a salary or wage.   It is only a relatively small percentage of people who are empowered by virtue of their own entrepreneurial endeavours, and, in any event, most of these, in turn, have been employed previously.     South African government at all levels seems to believe that unemployed people are able to establish and sustain business ventures of their own.     Some do, but they are in a tiny minority.  For the most part – research supports this - it is people who have been employed who start and sustain businesses successfully.

Thus, it is clear to me that the most important index of BEE is the unemployment rate.   It is employment which is the customary route to economic empowerment.    Yet, we know that government can only employ so many people, either directly in a bloated public service or through so-called extended public works programmes.     These should not be ignored as they do offer considerable opportunities, but perhaps not when they are in the hands of municipalities to administer.      The private sector must do the employing, but it is proving reluctant at present.   The effects of the recession may be blamed, but there are other factors as well.   Labour legislation, especially for small businesses, is intimidating and demanding in terms of insight and time.     Union agitation discourages employment, for it threatens to add extra burdens during wage negotiation season.   Seldom do these negotiations include reference to productivity.    While there are incentives by way of government subsidies for the use of technology, there are few such incentives to employ.   All in all, job creation makes a good talking point for government, but attracts too little actual attention in the realm of implementation.       

Leave a Comment