Ailing infrastructure at schools, mostly those damaged by the devastating floods, have been given a financial boost, according to the 2023/24 National Budget presented by Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana on Wednesday.
According to the budget, R283.3 million is added to the education infrastructure grant to repair infrastructure damage to schools in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal resulting from floods in April 2022, while a further R1.5 billion is allocated over the Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) period for the Gauteng schools project, which aims to improve infrastructure in schools.
Delivering his budget speech in Cape Town, Godongwana has allocated a total of R457.1 billion to the Learning and Culture function, which allocates funding to basic and post-school education and training, as well as sport, arts and culture.
The basic education sector receives 66.9% of this funding over the MTEF period.
According to the 2023 Budget Review, additional funding of R20 billion has been allocated through the provincial equitable share, mainly to cover shortfalls in basic education compensation budgets.
Funding for the national school nutrition programme grant is increased by R1.5 billion over the MTEF period to ensure that the meals provided to learners meet nutritional requirements.
The early childhood development grant receives an additional R1.6 billion over the medium term to increase the number of children receiving the early childhood development subsidy, provide pre-registration support to early childhood development centres, and pilot a nutrition support programme and a results-based delivery model where the service provider is only paid for the outputs delivered.
Additional funding of R198 million is allocated in 2023/24 to enable the provision of early childhood development resource packages, which include daily activity plans linked to the National Curriculum Framework.
Over the MTEF period, R30 million is allocated to improve the Department of Basic Education’s oversight and capacity for managing the programme. Godongwana says that departments are building their capacity to improve the planning, management and implementation of infrastructure projects and aligning budgets with their ability to spend.
The Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) has re-prioritised R1.1 billion over the medium term to enable the community education and training (CET) sector to build its own infrastructure for learning and teaching, reducing its current reliance on basic education school infrastructure.
Godongwana says that expenditure for the post-school education and training sector increases at an average annual rate of 5% over the medium term, supporting universities, technical and vocational education and training (TVET) colleges, CET colleges and sector education and training authorities in delivering quality post-school education and training.
According to the Minister’s report to Parliament at the time of the budget, the Portfolio Committee on Higher Education, Science and Technology noted the department needs additional funding to increase the enrolment of students in the TVET and CET sectors. It said that even though the budget of the department is projected to increase over the MTEF period, it remains inadequate to meet the National Development Plan targets for enrolment in these sectors and also inadequate to address the funding needs of the missing middle and postgraduate students who are unable to secure funding from other bursaries.
In response, the Ministry said that enrolments in the TVET and CET sectors have been below the set targets over the past three years, even after the targets were reduced and that the low enrolments are related to concerns about the quality and relevance of the programme offerings.
Over the 2023 MTEF period, R13.3 billion is allocated for TVET subsidies, growing at an average annual rate of 2.5%. An amount of R667.3 million is allocated to subsidies for CET colleges over the same period, growing at an average annual rate of 2.4%. Cabinet is engaging with the input from the Ministerial Task Team on student funding to find a sustainable solution to the increasing demand to provide funding for fee-free higher education to the missing middle and postgraduate students.
The arts, culture, sport and recreation sector is allocated R35.7 billion over the medium term to support sports in schools and preserve, develop and promote cultural, heritage and linguistic diversity, and build social cohesion.
For clarity, provinces are responsible for providing social services, including basic education for about 13.4 million learners.
In addition, the minister noted that he continues his efforts with the National Treasury, the private sector and international partners to secure additional funding for the science and innovation portfolio.
Over the 2023 MTEF period, the National Treasury, through the Budget Facility for Infrastructure, has allocated an additional R1.2 billion to the South African National Space Agency for the Space Infrastructure Hub project and an additional R1.3 billion to the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory to expand the Square Kilometre Array project.
Policy priorities in the science and innovation sector will need to be met through reallocations and re-prioritisation. An interdepartmental task team has also been established to improve planning and budget coordination of science, technology and innovation.
kailene.pillay@inl.co.za
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