There will be "serious winners and losers" as a result of the Fourth Industrial Revolution and South Africa needs to be properly prepared and positioned to reap the benefits, or be saddled with the negative consequences.
Trade and Industry Minister Dr Rob Davies on Tuesday said that emerging technologies have the capacity to benefit humanity in all sorts of ways, "reducing low-skilled back-breaking useless toil and replacing it with something more satisfying".
Davies, who is part of the South African delegation in Davos for the World Economic Forum (WEF), however, warned that "in a world with inequalities, this requires high levels of technological literacy. We could be facing serious winners and losers and people are saying we don't know yet.
"We don't know yet what the job implications are going to be. Lower skilled people are going to find it more difficult to get jobs, small businesses may find it easier to enter markers because the technology required may require less sunken capital to get into a line of activity."
Davies cited the recent WEF report Country Readiness for Future of Production which listed South Africa at 45th in the world and first in Africa, just ahead of Egypt in 46th place.
"We are in the category called nascent," explained Davies.
He said that in terms of the BRICS countries, South Africa followed China which is placed fifth, India and Russia which were 30th and 35th respectively, and Brazil which was 41st.
"There are a whole lot of things the reports cite which we take pretty seriously. Where we are good is on science and innovation and adoption of technologies, where we are not so good is on maths literacy, science education and skills development which I think we all already know.
"Government is looking at the implications of these technological changes and ensuring that our country is as prepared as it can be so that we can reap the benefits while minimising the challenges. And there will be challenges and disruptions, there will be challenges because that is what this technology is all about. So we are learning about that."
- African News Agency (ANA)
