Concerns have been raised by the Independent Regulatory Board for Auditors (Irba) on the skills shortage in South Africa’s auditing profession.

It has flagged low mathematics literacy, emigration, a negative perception of the industry, and international firms poaching top candidates as some of the major reasons fuelling the skills shortage in the industry.

The Board’s CEO Imre Nagy confirmed that most of the top auditing firms in South Africa have indicated the attractiveness of the profession as one of the emerging challenges.

Some of the causes for the decline in the industry's appeal were the high entry requirements to study accounting, high tuition fees, low pay, high work stress and tight deadlines in the auditing profession.

“The contest for talent in South Africa is exacerbated by low maths literacy significantly reducing the student pool; and a number of push-and-pull factors such as political and socio-economic instability that on the one hand pushes emigration, and on the other pulls our highly skilled and in-demand professionals to alleviate global shortages,” he said recently.

The low maths literacy in South Africa significantly reduced the number of students able to study accounting, Nagy said.

And, with the Covid-19 pandemic enabling remote working to communicate and perform audit work from anywhere in the world, many highly-skilled auditors choose to leave the country and work from elsewhere in the world.

Irba recently accredited the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) as an additional professional accounting body to address the skills shortage.

Nagy said this would provide another route to the audit specialisation programme for aspiring auditors.

The Board also planned to undertaking a situational analysis to restore confidence in the role of auditors and the regulator, which would include closer collaboration with auditors without compromising the regulator’s independence.

“Irba aims to issue a discussion paper next year to highlight the top five gaps identified in the ecosystem with recommendations that will address these gaps,” he said.

kailene.pillay@inl.co.za

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Regulatory board sounds alarm on skills shortage in South Africa's auditing sector