While preparing for a Federation of Unions of SA (Fedusa) conference on the “Social Impact of the Just Energy Transition”, I ruminated on the various transitions under way globally for the past 20 years. I tried to understand the impact on the ordinary union member.
When I was a child, during school holidays my dad would take me to his office, and I would spend the day building complex structures out of the 16mm film canisters that lay around. One of the perks of his job was two free movie tickets a month — for a child who loved the magic of cinema, my dad had the best job.
On Sundays my uncle, who lived a street away, would buy the Sunday Times; I would give him a few hours to read the main paper before skipping over to collect the Lifestyle section. I wanted to read Barry Ronge’s movie reviews, the TV guide and Gwen Gill’s social commentary, and do the crosswords.
Another favourite was the careers section, with the movers and shakers; I would look up salaries of the advertised vacancies to help me decide what to study at university. Once a year The Little Black Book was published, featuring black excellence and people I wanted to emulate.
That was also the first time I saw a woman who was an economist and a columnist, Nazmeera Moola. The fact that 20 years later I am an energy economist with a column in Business Day is truly a full-circle moment.
All this to say that transitions are continuously under way. Transitions from print to digital, from roadhouse drive-ins to “Netflix and chill”. There are children today who will never know what a drive-in or cinema is, who will never hold a newspaper in their hands, will never sit in front of a coal stove in winter, take a taxi or write using a pen.
As the energy sector faces its greatest transition we need to have a little more compassion for the people along the value chain. Hundreds of thousands of jobs will be severely affected, and industry will not be able to absorb all those who lose their jobs.
Does that mean we cannot transition? Absolutely not. But it does mean we need to transition at a pace and at a scale SA can afford economically, technically and, more importantly, socially.
Certain roles are ingrained in familial lineages, with indigenous knowledge and skills passing from generation to generation. A rock driller is the son of a rock driller is the grandson of a rock driller. A friend who does social performance for a mine tells me how it offers diversified training to young people to help them transition away from reliance on the mining sector. They offer IT, beauty, hospitality and business training, but the community doesn’t want these jobs.
Even among the youth there is a significant appreciation of what mining has done for generations before them and how mining jobs have changed the communities they live in. They’ve seen their neighbours, and their neighbours’ children, doing exceptionally well, driving 4x4s, employed as mining engineers and geologists, and living in mining houses, and they want the same for themselves and their children. They want jobs that will elevate their social and economic status, a job that will make their parents proud.
The stories of transitions often involve a complex tapestry of survival, hope, love, tradition, family and belonging. Sure, you can make e-tags mandatory, check out your own grocery items and pour your own fuel, effectively doing away with the tollbooth worker, cashier and fuel attendant — but at what cost? Where are the former employees of CD Warehouse, Musica, oil refineries, Kodak, Blockbuster and Comair?
Not transitioning has an economic cost, but there is also a real social cost that often goes unnoticed but permeates our society. You might not have been affected by a transition — not yet anyway — but gird your loins. Difficult transitions are coming for everyone.
• Mashele, an energy economist, is a member of the board of the National Transmission Company of SA.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.