Productivitysa Awards: Top performing companies in Gauteng receive awards

Sihle Sithela holds the award for her company aloft

The Regional Productivity Awards winners have been announced at a function held at the Bon Hotel Conference Centre in Midrand yesterday. The entity responsible for promoting productivity within South Africa, Productivity SA, awarded the best performers at the ceremony which will culminate in the regional award winners participating in the National Productivity Awards in October.

The regional awards provide a platform to inspire a competitive and productive South Africa.  Productivity improvement is considered the most effective way of ensuring ongoing competitiveness, economic growth and, consequently, more wealth for all. The CEO of Productivity SA, Mothunye Mothiba, says “We all need to pledge our support to the Productivity Movement in SA and business and government should work together to enable economic growth”.

 South Africa currently faces major challenges, for example how to create employment opportunities, stimulate economic growth and reduce poverty. If South Africa is to reduce unemployment and poverty, and increase its economic growth, its emphasis should be on developing productive capacity in all sectors of the economy.

The Productivity SA Awards seek to galavanise companies into adopting productivity as a fundamental tool to be more competitive. Productivity SA was created in 1969 as the then National Productivity Institute (NPI) and it focused on;

•      Providing assistance to individual companies in their productivity improvement programs.

 

•      Conducting research in the field of productivity and related matters.

 

•      Promoting training and education through specific programs

 

Productivity SA has developed various tools and models that includes measurement tools that determine to what extent an organisation’s financial performance is influenced by price recovery and productivity.   The National Productivity Awards were launched in 1979 and since then the awards have grown to become one of the most prestigious awards for business in South Africa.  The winners are:

 

·         Emerging Sector : Legaci Superior Dry Cleaning and Laundry Services

·         Co – operatives Sector : Prejonet Agricultural Primary  Co-Operative

·         Public Sector : City of Tshwane (Rosslyn Electricity Depot)
·         Corporate Sector : Rothe Plantscapers

The government entity tasked with employment growth and productivity improvement, Productivity SA, has suspended its chief financial officer (CFO). The suspension follows alleged irregularities pertaining to the management of funds provided by the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) for employment growth.

 

Since 2010, the UIF has provided Productivity SA with funding to the tune of R188 171 000.00. In terms of the agreement between the UIF and Productivity SA, the monies are availed on the proviso that the funds will be utilized to support companies in economic distress (financial and operational).

 

The support offered to companies by Productivity SA is multi-pronged and includes implementation of productivity improvement programmes within the companies. The ultimate aim of the support is to turn around the companies, thereby ensuring sustainability within South African enterprises.

 

However, it has emerged that a figure of about R36 million-pending investigation- has since 2011 been allegedly utilised for activities that are not related to job saving as per the contract between UIF and Productivity SA. This has allegedly resulted in the failure to meet targets and to date 372 companies were assisted as opposed to the target of 550.

 

In discovering the alleged irregularities, the Productivity SA CEO, Mothunye Mothiba, with the full support of the Board suspended Productivity SA‘s CFO pending further investigation. The suspension of the CFO follows the earlier dismissal of a senior Productivity SA employee who, following an investigation initiated by the Board was found guilty of fraud.

 

The Chairman of the Productivity SA Board, Mthunzi Mdwaba, says “the Board has commissioned an investigation to ascertain the extent of the alleged irregularities and to ensure accountability. Mothiba says “the entity is committed to serving the nation in mitigating issues of unemployment and saving jobs whilst investigations are underway”.

 

Productivity SA is an entity of the Labour Department and it is established in terms of Section 31 of the Employment Services Act, No. 4 of 2014 as a juristic person, with the mandate to promote employment growth and productivity.  Productivity SA is funded by the National Treasury for working capital,  the Unemployment Insurance Fund(UIF) for programmes aimed at saving jobs and the Department of Trade and Industry (dti) for productivity improvement within South African enterprises

 

Productivity SA held its annual general meeting (AGM) at the end of September 2016 to inform key stakeholders such as government, business, labour and media about the performance of the organisation.