The City of Cape Town’s Directorate Corporate Services has, through the Infrastructure Skills Development Grant Programme (ISDG), helped unemployed engineering and science graduates register with the various professional bodies like SACNASP, ECSA and SACPLAN. The National Treasury has been funding the ISDG Programme since July 2014.

The purpose of the ISDG programme is to enhance capacity and build a pool of resources within the City through the training and registration of unemployed graduates with their respective statutory councils.

The ISDG programme is an expansion of an existing internal Graduate Internship Programme and the City’s Human Resources Department has structures in place to support it.

Since its inception in July 2014, the ISDG programme has seen graduates who successfully completed the ISDG training programme placed at various professional bodies. Some of the successes include the following:

• A total of 87 graduates and four Project Administrators have been appointed and placed at various branches within the City
• Nine graduates professionally registered with the South African Council Natural Scientific Professions (SACNASP)
• Five graduates professionally registered with the Engineering Council of South Africa (ECSA)
• One graduate professionally registered with the South African Council for Planners (SACPLAN)
• Currently, 34 of the graduates are permanent City employees.

‘The ISDG programme is crucial in imparting specific scarce skills, abilities and knowledge. It is encouraging to see how many graduates have already benefitted from this programme. The City is always looking at ways of providing opportunities to the youth, and this is an excellent example of how we are assisting these bright minds to enter the job market. Furthermore, one of our priorities is to support skills development initiatives in high-growth sectors to create the skills base required for a growing economy.

‘We will continue to invest in infrastructure to ensure that Cape Town has the capacity to support development and our growing population’s needs. As cities expand, their industries and people need to be supported by adequate services, from electricity, water and other amenities to additional services that aid modern development, such as a broadband network and public transport networks,’ said the City’s Mayoral Committee Member for Corporate Services, Alderman Theresa Uys.

Source: City Of Cape Town