The department of home affairs has at last issued new work visa regulations that will make it easier for skilled foreigners to come and work in SA.
The regulations, gazetted on the eve of the Easter weekend on March 28, introduce new remote work visas for foreigners earning more than R1m a year who want to relocate to SA. They introduce a points system to replace the controversial critical skills list.
The home affairs minister has to publish a notice outlining the points system criteria, promised for end-April. This approach will provide more flexibility for skilled visa applicants than the existing system, enabling foreigners with appropriate qualifications and experience earning above a threshold to seek work in SA, rather than targeting particular skills or professions.
This was one of the recommendations of a 2023 review for the presidency led by former home affairs director-general Mavuso Msimang. The review recommended a new “trusted employer” system to fast-track skilled work visa applications by large companies that need foreign expertise and were accredited by the department. That was introduced, and more than 100 employers are accredited.
Reforms to SA’s skilled work visa regime are one of the priority areas President Cyril Ramaphosa targeted to boost economic growth and job creation. The new regulations were finalised in September and expected to be gazetted in December. It’s not clear why there was such a long delay; it’s understood it was only when the president intervened to put pressure on the home affairs department that the regulations were finally gazetted last week.
The long process parallels delays in many other areas for growth-boosting reform which the presidency’s three-year-old Operation Vulindlela has been working to fast-track, often with resistance or inertia in the government. It made progress on structural reforms in the electricity and water sectors, as well as in the tourist visa system.
The new work visa regulations will make it easier to get work visas for skilled foreigners such as film crew, academics, journalists and teachers at international schools who need to work in SA. They streamline lengthy requirements to get foreign qualifications accredited by local bodies and rules requiring applicants to submit X-rays and police clearance certificates.
The Msimang review found that from 2014 to 2021 home affairs rejected more than half the applications for critical skills visas and more than three-quarters of business visa applications with department figures showing that fewer than 26,000 skilled work visas were approved over the six years.
Constraint
“Existing immigration policies have not worked well to attract skilled global talent,” said the Msimang review published last year. SA’s work visa processes were slow and complex ... this is a constraint to attracting much-needed skills”.
Stats SA migration data last week showed that on average more than 20,000 South Africans a year left from 2000 to 2020, and only some returned. More than 900,000 South Africans live abroad, almost half in Europe and North America and 30% in Australia and New Zealand. Many leavers are highly qualified and experienced.
Business organisations have been calling for work visa system reform. Business Leadership SA said in 2023 that the regime made it hard to get the skilled immigrants the economy needed. That made it harder for businesses to expand operations CEO Busi Mavuso said last year. “Foreign firms cannot commit to major investments in SA when they cannot be confident they can send their top people.”
Treasury economic models show that addressing the skills shortage is one of the reforms with the biggest potential to lift economic growth, said the Msimang review. Workers with critical skills could create more than one lesser-skilled job.
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