The demand for AI skills is growing in South Africa, and many South Africans believe that important reskills are needed.
According to new employment insights from CareerJunction for the second quarter of 2024, demand for AI skills has gradually but consistently increased over the past three years, up 94%.
Thus, Career-sunction has better examined job seekers' trends to understand AI skills in the South African workforce.
Over the past three years, the number of job seekers with AI skills has increased by 61%.
Machine Learning (ML) AI skills, predictive modeling and artificial intelligence expertise primarily acquires job seekers the following occupations:
- Data Analysis/Data Warehousing
- System/Network Management
If we break it down further, the following skill set shows a high adaptation to the genai occupation:
Software Development
- Software Engineering/Development,
- Machine learning,
- Web development,
- Business Development (BI) Skills,
- General (full stack) development skills
System/Network Management
- System engineering,
- Technical IT skills
Data Analysis/Data Warehousing
- Data Science,
- Data analysis,
- Data engineering,
- Business intelligence analysis,
- Machine learning,
- Quantitative analysis
education
- lecture
- Educational support
Global differences
CareerJunction also supported its parent company, Stepstone Group, in a study on how trends in the AI era affect the global workforce.
Global studies show similar results to those in South Africa, with job seekers participating in IT and education.
Stepstone Group's global research shows that job seekers in South Africa are highly aware of the impact that AI generals have.
South Africa ranks ninth in regards to job seekers' perceptions of the importance of AI generals in changing job roles.
Over 36% of South Africa job seekers say Genai will have a significant impact on their job duties over the next five years and will need to be reskilled (green bars in the graphics below).
Kenya ranked number one in terms of recognizing the influence of Genai. 46% of job seekers in Kenya say that genai will have a major impact on their job demand and will require that growing skills.
Germany is on the other end of the scale, with 10% of respondents thinking that Genai would have a major impact on his job within the next five years.
Developed countries, including Denmark, Ireland and Austria, were far more likely to believe their work did not require any significant reskills.
That will change
Despite Genai's skills, employment in IT roles is continuing to decline as employment activities fell 21% year-on-year in Q2 2024.
However, demand for IT professionals remains very high in the recruitment market. The sector saw a 4% increase in employment activity between the first quarter 2024 and the second quarter 2024.
“The trend in South Africa's demand for IT professionals is declining, so they are more involved in the local job market,” says Career -junction.
“While the wide range of IT job seekers have previously been headhunts and did not need to be involved in the job market, this trend appears to be changing, with job seekers beginning to actively interact with the job market more frequently than before.”
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