This paper explores systems and mechanisms to support the recognition of migrants’ skills in Africa, with a focus on the Southern African Development Community. This includes national and regional qualifications frameworks as well as other systems and mechanisms. The recognition of migrants’ skills is a complex issue. The research was conducted because there are some indications that many countries, both in sending and receiving countries, migrant workers, especially women, are over-represented in jobs that require skills and qualifications well below what they possess (OECD/ILO, 2018; Amo-Agyei, 2020). Lack of recognition of migrants’ skills may also make it difficult at times for employers to find people with the skills they require. Many countries have created mechanisms and systems for recognizing qualifications and skills. We wanted to understand the extent to which the systems for the recognition of skills and qualifications that are in place in African countries are benefiting migrant workers in practice.

Qualifications frameworks were a focus of the investigation, given an international policy focus on, and extremely high hopes for, qualifications frameworks and associated mechanisms but without an accompanying literature on impact (Allais, 2011). Qualifications frameworks have emerged as global phenomenon in the context of a range of concerns and problems since the 1980s, including supporting labour market mobility. The African Union is planning an African Credit and Qualifications Framework with, officially, the aim of supporting integration of economies and movement of people across the continent (African Union, 2020). A key aim of the research was to consider the extent to which qualifications frameworks are integrated with other mechanisms for recognizing migrants’ skills, as well as the extent to which they help or hinder migrants to get skills recognized, and whether or not this improves their labour market outcomes. This was located in a broader consideration of literature on skill formation in Africa and internationally (Lauder, Brown and Ashton, 2017; Martin, 2017; Oliver, Yu and Buchanan, 2019), as we attempted to separate genuine problems from the tools introduced to solve them. Analysing and solving problems such as skill recognition is hampered by the aggressive promotion of policy mechanisms that claim to solve them, in the absence of positive evidence. Such policies can divert attention from the reality of the problems as well as the possibilities of developing more appropriate and targeted interventions (Allais, 2020).

The methodology for the study had four main components: an analysis of key reports and policy documents; a survey of vocational education stakeholders and roleplayers across the continent; interviews with officials from qualifications authorities in 6 countries as well as Vocational Education and Training (VET) authorities and interviews with representatives from three Regional Economic Communities in Africa; and an in-depth focus on two countries through interviews with employer associations and a survey of their members. The focus on vocational education role-players was decided on given that VET systems engage with skills for mid-level and semi-skilled workers, and that this seems to be (and this was confirmed in our interviews) the area where formal systems for recognition of skills are least functional. We developed an overview of the migration patterns in the SADC region; an overview of the implementation of the SADC Qualifications Framework and a description of the existing recognition and portability mechanisms that exist in SADC countries; a description of the initiatives and services, at both national and regional level, that are in place to support the portability and recognition of skills of migrant workers and their family members; and an analysis of the extent to which these processes are perceived to be having a positive impact on the lives of individual migrants and on the economy

We found a bewildering number of agreements, policies, tools and structures in Africa for the recognition of qualifications, all of which aim in different ways to support recognition of skills and qualifications in the region. There is limited information about the extent to which these are benefitting migrant workers. Skills recognition is seen as a high priority for policy makers, and qualifications frameworks, as well as recognition of prior learning systems and credit accumulation and transfer mechanisms, are believed to be appropriate policy mechanisms for skill recognition. However, there is a concerning dislocation between policy aspirations and the experiences of implementation to-date. Further, while we could find some (limited) data on the number of qualifications recognized per annum, there is no publicly available documentation that provides insights about the extent to which migrants are then able to access either education or work. The study questions whether the challenges facing migrants relating to wage differentials can be addressed by the qualification recognition and portability mechanisms in place, given the complicated regulatory environment pertaining to work permits. In most cases visa requirements are complex, involving many ministries and agencies. Interview responses suggest that visa allocation is driven by national analysis of skills shortages, and usually related to specifically designated sectors and occupations; second, these are for highly skilled workers; and thirdly, processes are complex and cumbersome. Further, migrants who get qualifications verified are primarily applying for higher education qualifications to be verified. The biggest challenges are for recognition and hiring of workers with mid-level (vocational education) skills. Employers surveyed suggest that political factors are more important than qualification recognition in terms of barriers to employing migrants.

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