Solving the problem of Tanzania’s low skills, low cost workers in the 21st Century
By Neema Masika
In his opening address to the Tanzania Development Vision 2025, the former President Benjamin Mkapa wrote that the Country stood at the threshold of the 21st century and that it would be “a century dominated by those with advanced technological capacity, high productivity, modern and efficient transport and communication infrastructure and, above all highly skilled manpower imbued with initiative.”
With this foresight, it is clear that Mkapa and his team recognized the importance of education in bringing about the 2025 vision. Much investment has gone into education over the last ten years, for instance, Tanzania has increased its primary school enrollment rate from 59 percent in 2001 to 96% by 2009, according to the Ministry of Education and Vocational Training data and tripled enrolment figures at secondary levels since 2005, it is still facing an acute ‘skills shortage’ characterized by the phrase “low skills, low cost Tanzanian workers,” who are competing against ‘high skills, high cost workers’ from abroad.
In many ways the educational achievements can be proclaimed as one of the country’s success stories. Tanzania is close to attaining the Millennium Development Goal on universal primary education, with 96% children enrolling and many being from poorest households. Yet this is far from enough when considering the challenge of transforming the country into the highly productive, modern and efficient, high tech economy, articulated by the 2025 goal.
Perhaps the question of achieving universal access has come into conflict with maintaining quality as President Kikwete indicates in an interview published in the October Issue of Vodaworld 2009. “After ensuring access, we turned our attention to dealing with the quality. The quality of education is assured by a number of things, two important ones being availability of enough teachers and teaching materials.
“When I came into office in 2005,” the President continues, “we had 52 teacher training colleges, today we have 77 of them, both at government level and private teacher training colleges that will be able to enroll 22,282 new teachers every year. We have also increased the number of graduate degree holding teachers from 500 in 2005 to 5,322 next year.” Clearly the figures quoted by the President on teacher availability are impressive but again, they do not meet the ideal target of one teacher for every 45 students, as stated in Mkukuta. The ratio is, at present, one teacher for every 54 children, still considered too high to ensure quality.
Modesta Lilian Mahiga, a human resources expert, running her own company, called Professional Approach Ltd which gives advice to young people on self development, goes further by calling into question the type of education on offer. She is sad that the system relies too much on paper qualifications that do not encourage creativity and innovation. “We need to develop a more entrepreneurial, driven, competitive and accountable society. Education is more than producing people who read and write. Being under a command economy under Ujamaa, we were carried by the State. Decades on, there remains the tendency to let “other people” take responsibility. This is not the human resource that will drive the 2025 vision.”
Modesta would like to see a system that produces graduates who take initiative and advantage of the opportunities surrounding them. “With our current system, young people are simply taught subjects but not how to transfer that knowledge to the world of work. It is unfortunate that critical and creative “out of the box” thinking is not encouraged, especially in primary and secondary schools. We produce people who are brilliant in class but seldom know how to recognize opportunities outside of it. What results is that many do that which is provided for only in the job description. What we must realize is that meeting expectations isn’t an achievement, it is a minimum.” Modesta asserts that, “to let go of Ujamaa in people’s minds, we must replace it with a different order. This is Modesta’s mission and through her company she sets out to empower Tanzanians to positively change the way they think, perform and present themselves for Tanzania’s economic development.
Much of what Modesta is doing is in line with reforms already undertaken by Dr Olomi, the Director of the University of Dar es Salaam Entrepreneurship Centre from July 1999 to June 2009, at his institution or by means of advocacy through various policy documents. “Much of the poverty situation in rural areas and urban unemployment can be attributed to the youth’s unpreparedness to take advantage of resources. Poverty is a more of a mindset,” he says.
Dr Olomi explains that as a nation we are not accustomed to making the most out of opportunities, even ‘time’ as a resource, is wasted in Tanzania. He says, “nobody thinks of time as a resource but how people use time is reflective of their level of efficiency. We do not even use our own human resources effectively. In our public institutions, few senior officers assign duties and oversee implementation in a way that ensures maximum use of the talents and skills at the work place. As a result, a lot of human capital, which is the only dynamic resource capable of acting on and transforming all other resources to greater value, is wasted. This is especially so in the public sector where many leaders care more about their personal gain than the value they create.
“The problem is one of leadership from the top down and from the bottom up. We need leaders who realize that true development must start and end with people and that it must come from within, not outside. With this confidence, they can inspire confidence and change at all levels.” Dr Olomi cites the four bodies of the education system that need tackling first to gain results. These are: the regulatory quality assurance bodies as Tanzania Commission for Universities (TCU), National Council for Technical Education (NACTE), Tanzania Institute of Education (TIE) and Vocational Education and Training Authority (VETA).
Dr Olomi advises that we should learn from Asian countries or even countries from the region, particularly since we have just established the customs union in East Africa. He mentions Rwanda as an example of a country that is achieving transformation through heavy investment in education and human capacity, but more importantly visionary and effective leadership. “We cannot expect to bring out self reliant and confident children if our nation is perceived as emotionally, economically and culturally dependent on other nations. The leadership in Rwanda seems to be taking ownership of the development agenda and this is a powerful foundation for confidence building among children.”
“But all is not lost,” Dr Olomi reassures, as he gives examples of institutions that are offering innovative approaches to teaching and learning. One such school is Capstone Christian School in Mbezi Beach, Dar es Salaam.. Mr Willbroad Prosper, the Principal explains that there are no teachers or even classes but students are encouraged to learn at their own pace and even mark their own work using a system of supervisors and monitors represented by flags.
“When we need a teacher, or rather supervisor or monitor to check our work, we place a flag on our desks and they come to give assistance,” explains Rachel Magege, a confident, 18 year old in her final year. Her younger sister Gloria, 17 years explains that students are encouraged to set their own goals when learning a topic and mark their own work using a well designed system of checks and balances. “This encourages honesty, self discipline and confidence.” It is even more remarkable that the school has no use for end of year exams to assess student progress. Instead, reports from “class work” or ‘learning centers’ as they prefer to call them are submitted to academic centers that oversee the ACE curriculum that originates from South Africa. The scores are certified and sent back as qualifications. The school is currently communicating with the Ministry of Education to allow students to join local universities through the NECTA accreditation system.
Whereas the ACE system is not suitable for the whole Country, it certainly provides an original approach to learning, particular for Tanzania. What is suitable and can be addressed immediately is the question of having more qualified teachers at all levels and reducing class sizes to deliver a more competency based curriculum with teaching materials already in use. With these reforms it is possible to produce the right type of workforce fit for 21st century.
Tanzanians very distant in Long-Distance Running
By Moses John
THE word Kilimanjaro turns our minds back to the highest mountain peak in Africa and one of the loftiest on planet Earth, yet at least 4,500 runners from across the world were taking part in an annual challenge under the foot hills of this African roof top - Mount Kilimanjaro.
It was a cool Sunday, Moshi town was surrounded by clouds, the Kibo peak itself indeed was covered – then at twenty minutes past six, great noises were heard and the pistol shots indicated the start of the 42.2 kilometre full marathon, for Kimanjaro 2010.
Here I can only write of two big names, since I did special exclusive interviews with them, Stephen Kibiwott Chebogut, a Kenyan youth of 25 years who won the 42.2 kilometre full marathon in only 2:14hrs, and Frida Lodeba also a Kenyan but a young lady of 28, the winner of the 21 kilometre half marathon.
The Kilimanjaro Marathons this year was dominated by Kenyan runners, not only Steven and Frida but also a great number of champions in the tournament were Kenyans, for instance, in the full marathon, the winner, first runner-up and second runner-up were all Kenyan, moreover in both full and half marathons many positions were occupied by them.
Stephen Kibiwott Chebogut says “I am happy to win this tournament, although there were challenges which I think added some minutes to my race, for instance we were not given water in bottles, instead they gave it us in these kind of cups which take some seconds to use for drinking while running; if this were to be modernized maybe I would have finished sooner.”
This is was the first time Chebogut had taken part in the Kilimanjaro Marathon, although he had participated in another three major marathons in Kenya, the first tournament in his country he finished in 2:43 and the second, which was the Kass marathon held at Eldoret, he finished in 2:23 and the third marathon he knocked off in 2:26.
Now he had won the title for the Kilimanjaro 2010 in 2:14 hours, where are the Tanzanians to show the flag in such trials of distance running, at the moment? And yet we cannot stay far from names like Suleiman Nyambui, Juma Ikangaa, Kidamis Shahanga and Filbert Bayi in long distance running in this country, because these were heroes of the nation when they did wonders at the international level.
For the Kilimanjaro Marathon is an opportunity for Tanzanians to figure in the competition so that they can bring home prizes and learn more as well as creating an image and an example for young Tanzanians, yet there are still low numbers of our countrymen who win the super trophies, whilst there is also very low promotion in long running races at the moment in this country.
Most of the companies and institutions which might sponsor such sports are not engaged in promoting new talents, although some are trying their best to revive the distance running in this fair land of ours. From such a situation, the great question is what is happening in Kenya?
No doubt that most Tanzanians do love football more than other sports, but we have to invest in other sports not only football, so that other talents may be created and developed like our fellow Kenyans do.
Frida Lodeba the twenty-eight year-old young lady who, also a Kenyan, won the half marathon title says: “I am happy to win this title again, although this is not the first time I have won such a race, in fact I also won last year’s Bangkok marathon and that was a full marathon - this is like my bit of practice for that big tournament this June - in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia”.
A corporate runner for the half marathon from Tanga Cement, Michael Chikoma, said: “Amazing that when I was about six kilometers along the route I met with the first full marathon runner for the 42 kilometres on the way back, he passed me like a jet airplane, then while I was still going at about eight kilometers I was crossed by this young lady also coming back, actually it is really these people who are the professionals, both the boy and the lady”.
He said “I am still thrilled to have taken part in this year’s tournament because I’m getting experience anyway, and I’m happy too because I’ve done what I set out to do in this corporate running race.”
Athletics Tanzania Assistant Secretary-General, Julius Msomi, said earlier: “The Kilimanjaro Marathon 2010 will once again be a showcase of the country's top long-distance talent, where some of the big Tanzanian marathon super stars, like Samwel Kwaang, Patrick Nyangero, Banuelia Brington and Jumanne Tluway will participate in this year’s tournaments to race on the foothills of Mt Kilimanjaro”.
The winners of the full Marathon this year were one hundred percent Kenyans, not only the champion Steven Chebogut but the first runner-up David Kipromo and second runner-up Julius Tumakui were all from Kenya, so Chebogut got a three million shilling reward as the victor of the Kilimanjaro 42 kilometre full marathon.
The guest of honour at this year’s tournament was Prime Minister Mizengo Pinda, accompanied by Deputy Minister, Ministry of Information, Culture and Sports Joel Bendera, who witnessed the start of the race early in the morning at the stadium.
It is the time for Tanzanians to learn through our fellows how they accomplish their triumphs, so as to implement the same, even more so that we can also revive our long distance races, because this country was also in a high position in those former years, but the light has disappeared to the end of the tunnel.
It is the responsibility of all of us to play our part so that we can make changes, because together we can make it, let’s start today and not tomorrow because tomorrow is forever.
The Kilimanjaro Marathon 2010 race was sponsored by Kilimanjaro Premium Lager, Vodacom, Tanzania Tourist Board, Tanga Cement, DT Dobie, New Africa Hotel, Goodyear Tyres, Tanzanite One, KK Security, Keys Hotel, TPC Sugar and Kilimanjaro Water.