South Africa has one engineer for every 3,000 people.
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Vishal Haripersad, president of Consulting Engineers South Africa (Cesa), said said the country faced a critical shortage of engineers, with a current deficit of around 60,000 professionals.
Speaking at the CESA Infrastructure Indaba at the Durban International Convention Centre today, Haripersad said: "The statistics are stark: relative to our population, South Africa has one engineer for every 3,000 people, compared with about one engineer for every 300 people in a developed country. By our estimates, we are currently short of around 60,000 professionals, including engineers, technicians, and technologists."
The government has allocated R1 trillion to infrastructure investment over the next three years, but Haripersad cautioned that without addressing the skills shortage and improving technical capacity in both the public and private sectors, the funds may not achieve their intended impact.
"We're way short. And the problem with that is it’s not just in the private sector, it’s also in the public sector, where we are short. Taking what you said about the trillion rand and how the government is investing it, a lot of that money needs to go into the public sector: municipalities, state-owned entities, national government, and so on, to provide roads, water, power supply, and sanitation.
"In the public sector, there is a dire need to capacitate competent, qualified technical people, and that’s a real challenge. We know it’s there. The government is driving professionalisation of the public sector, but we are woefully short of where we need to be."
He called for engineers to have more of a say in planning and decision-making processes, noting that across the country, engineers are often seen as a cheap commodity.
"A lot of the people who make decisions in public sector utilities about how to spend the R1 trillion, what to allocate it to, and how to strategise are not technically competent or qualified. And that’s the problem in the public sector.
"In the private sector, we face other systemic challenges. A key issue is that engineering skills and the quality of engineering are often seen as a commodity to be procured at the lowest price. The problem with that is you get what you pay for. Driving prices down also affects mentorship, training, and the ability to invest in the next generation," he said.