The Sector Education and Training Authority (Seta) sector was here to stay and would not be scrapped, Higher Education and Training Minister Blade Nzimande asserted on Thursday.

He said during the National Skills Summit that Seta's would remain a "central cog" of the country's skills development mechanisms.

Calls to scrap the Seta system were "misguided and dangerous", as well as "mischievous", stated Nzimande.

"These calls are bizarre and ill-considered, because they are based on the assumption that the colleges and Setas perform the same function. This is not the case. While the colleges are education and training providers, the Setas do not provide training,” he noted," he noted.

The Setas were required to disburse 80% of the skills development levy funds for training purposes.

Nzimande emphasised that the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) was aware of the challenges that the Setas were facing in terms of performance and efficiency and were at an advanced stage of dealing with these problems.

The Minister would finalise the redesign of the Seta landscape within the next few week and would allow for better alignment of skills development according to the sectoral needs.

Nzimande said that the new Seta programme, along with the National Skills Development Strategy III (NSDS III), which would be implemented in the next six months, and the Human Resource Development Council, would allow the DHET to "turn the corner" in skills planning and development.

Federation of Unions of South Africa general-secretary Dennis George agreed that the Setas should not be scrapped, and expressed the federation's support of the NSDS III.

Congress of South African Trade Unions representative Dumo Dlamini shared the view that the NSDS III was a positive contribution, noting that the anti-corruption and rural development strategies, as set out under the NSDS III, were especially critical.

Meanwhile, The Minister also urged employers in both the public and private sectors, as well as professional associations, to provide greater buy-in for education and employment training opportunities.

"It is essential that the business sector and professional organisations partner us to open up workplaces for learnerships, apprenticeships and workplace experience in order to improve the employability of young people," he stated.

Nzimande noted that State-owned enterprises, which already had a history of artisan training, had a particularly important role in driving skills development and training initiatives.

"They have already started strengthening their training capacities in the last couple of years and need to continue doing so, so that they once again become training power houses, producing skills to serve not only their own needs but those of the economy as a whole," said the Minister.

Business Unity South Africa CEO Jerry Vilakazi agreed that business had an important role to play in ensuring that the country had a productive labour force.

South Africa could not afford to deindustrialise and a productive labour force is required to continue driving the industrialisation and development of the economy, he stated.

Meanwhile, Nzimande also highlighted the role that municipalities and provincial governments could play in skills development, particularly in rural areas where other employment opportunities were in short supply.

The National Skills Summit was aimed at integrating the capabilities of business, labour, the DHET and other education and training organisations to improve skills development.

Among the topics under discussion, were the issues outlined in terms of the DHET's performance agreement with President Jacob Zuma.

The DHET and Nzimande had committed to delivering five outputs, the first of which was the establishment of a credible institutional mechanism for skills planning.

A second output would be to increase access to intermediate and high-level learning for youth and adults who do not meet entry requirements for post-school programmes.

The DHET was aiming to increase Adult Basic Education and Training level 4 entrants to 300 000 people a year, up from the current baseline of 269 229.

Further, the department was also planning to increase national certificate vocational (NCV) success rates, to create “second-chance” bridging programmes that would lead to a matric-equivalent for those who did not hold a senior certificate and to provide learning options for those who passed grade 12, but did not meet university entrance requirements.

Thirdly, the DHET had committed itself to increasing access to occupationally-directed programmes in needed areas with special focus on artisan training.

The department was planning to increase the number of learnerships to at least 20 000 a year by 2014, while also aiming to produce 10 000 artisans a year by the same time.

The DHET would also put measures in place to improve the trade test pass rate to 60% by 2014, up from 46% in 2009.

Further, it would also aim to increase the placement rate of learners from learnership, apprenticeship and NCV programmes to 70%.

Another output agreement would entail increasing access to high-level skills in target areas such as in the fields of engineering, animal and health sciences, physical and life sciences and teacher education.

The DHET would aim to increase the graduate output in Engineering Sciences and the Animal and Human health sector graduates to more than 15 000 a year for each sector by 2014.

Natural and Physical Sciences graduates were targeted to increase to 8 000 a year and Teacher Education graduates to 12 000 a year.

Lastly, the department would improve the research, development and innovation in human development to ensure a growing knowledge economy.

Nzimande highlighted that only 33% of academics with PhDs were actively involved in research activities and could competently guide research students. Also, the country's shrinking and ageing population of academics would lead to a serious continuity gap in key research infrastructure.

By 2014, the DHET was aiming to increase the number of honour graduates to 20 000 a year, research masters graduates to 4 500 a year, doctoral graduates to 1 350 a year and post-doctoral graduates to 100 a year.

Another issue under discussion during the summit had been the need for recognition of prior learning (RPL) at qualifications and quality councils. An RPL framework with these councils would have to be urgently worked on, said the Minister.