Employment creation in public works : Labour-intensive construction in sub-saharan Africa: The implications for South Africa

Unemployment is one of South Africaʹs most pressing problems. There is also a widely acknowledged need for housing and infrastructure, both urban (water supply, sewerage reticulation and treatment, storm-water drainage, streets, electrical supply and waste disposal) and rural (dams, irrigation canals and roads). These problems are set within a low level of individual and community capacity in both technical and institutional terms. From a theoretical perspective supported by experience elsewhere in Africa, there are reasons for considering that properly constructed employment-creation programmes based on the use of labour-intensive methods could be established to construct and maintain the required physical infrastructure, thus creating employment, skills and institutional capacities. Following a summary of the main tenets of labour-intensive construction, this paper will provide a brief description of two major programmes in Kenya and Botswana and will draw the main conclusions as to the reasons for their success. Implications for South Africa will then be derived. In the light of the experience elsewhere in Africa recent developments in South Africa will then be described and assessed. The paper will conclude that for success to be achieved a four-phase approach will be required to institute large programmes of labour-intensive construction and maintenance.