BRICS skills exchange to help South Africa develop critical skills: official

JOHANNESBURG, Sept. 8 (Xinhua) -- The skills exchange with other BRICS nations will help South Africa improve its critical skills and benchmarking with other countries, South African Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation Blade Nzimande said Friday.

"We look forward to sharing best practices with our BRICS counterparts and being part of the journey to remodel and align the educational outcomes in our institutions with the demands required by the economy," Nzimande said when commenting on the BRICS Future Skills Challenge, a competition scheduled to take place in Johannesburg from Sept. 12 to 15 with hundreds of competitors from around the BRICS nations.

"We are confident that this initiative will serve as a conduit of innovative entrepreneurs and highly skilled workforce for industries, not only in South Africa and the continent but across BRICS countries and beyond," said Nzimande.

The minister said they would like to generate the skills required to drive the growth of new industries and fuel the digitization of South Africa's economy.

The youths aged 18 to 35 from BRICS countries will take part in the skills challenge in aircraft maintenance, agri internet of things, building information modeling, cyber security, data science and digital twin. They will be tested in drone technologies, internet marketing, manufacturing robotics, renewable energy and robotic process automation, according to South Africa's BRICS Business Council, the organizer.