ABB South Africa, Eskom, Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, Alpha Ltd, Power Technologies Limited, Defy, Nu-World Industries, Old Mutual and Department of Labour

The Lungisa project started in 1997, its name meaning, "Fix it" in Ngumi Languages. The project´s aim is to help empower unemployed and disabled people from disadvantaged areas, by giving them the technical and business training they need to open up their own businesses. The technical training includes formation in simple repairs of household appliances such as stoves, irons, kettles, etc., single phase house wiring or welding skills such as window frame manufacture, furniture design and manufacture burglar bars. This training is done in conjunction with the local community and other role players and lasts for 8 weeks. During the last week of the course, the participants learn a basic business-training course to ensure their success as entrepreneurs in the market. The course finishes with final qualifying exams.

In addition to the training, the successful graduates receive basic tools to assist them in the starting of their business as well as an aftercare programme. The aftercare programme lasts for 6 months where the graduates have at least one day’s contact each month to help them with any problems they have in putting their skills into practice.

Lungisa is one of ABB’s most important social responsibility projects. It’s sponsors include a number of prominent South Africa corporations an because of its success rate it also attracts funding from the Department of Labour. Success has enabled the Lungisa project to grow and diversify, increasing its contribution towards local sustainability. In addition to electrical and welding training, courses on refrigeration and hydroponics are now offered. Furthermore, the Department of Correctional Services is using Lungisa as a model for rehabilitation of ex-offenders on their release.

This project involves all legs of sustainability and uses the definition of sustainability has of being the “ non declining stock of human, social, environmental and man made capital”. The project is a predominantly social project with the main objective being the investment and increase of human capital through education and social capital through employment. Consequently, the community in question benefits through social uplifting and community development. The Lungisa project does not have a fixed location of action. The 8-week course is constantly being taught in different areas of South Africa. The location of the next course is chosen according to the area’s necessities and resources available. The project provides the graduates around the country with the necessary tools to find employment as well as create their own employment thus creating a new market for second hand electrical goods. Consequently this also promotes the use of cleaner power in economically disadvantaged areas. The creating of employment in communities where the unemployment ranges between 40% and 80% contributes to general social well being and economic stability. This is fundamental to the development of new markets. In terms of economic sustainability, even though there is no direct benefit to ABB-SA, except in cases where ABB-SA employees are sent on the courses, the investment is of broad significance. ABB-SA not only empowers people that later on can possible work for ABB but they also get considerable publicity from the programme in the media.

In terms of environmental sustainability, improvement in the quality of life of a community leads to an increase in the demand for environmental quality as well as an increase in education, which additionally leads to a higher environmental consciousness.

The Lungisa project has been the biggest success story of ABB-SA social responsibility projects. Its success is generally high – significantly better than other similar initiatives. These achievements are measured by the graduate’s salary earned. Six months after their course some 60% of graduates are earning at least R1,000 per month. Some do exceptionally well, and so far three Lungisa graduates earning more that R6,000 per month have been identified.

The success of the project can also be seen measured by its timelife of 5 years and the increasing number of SA business partnerships that want to be involved as well as government’s involvement. An example of the latter is the Department of Correctional services that uses Lungisa as a model for rehabilitation of ex-offenders on their release. Another example that the course has been found to have a better success rate than its competitors is the sponsorship of the Department of Labour.

To ensure that a project such as this is successful in another country or even in South Africa, the investors need to look at the needs and wants of the community in question. Additionally, there is also a need for community involvement through the usage of local employees and government support and agreements such as with the Department of Correctional Services. The Lungisa project started with an 8-week course on electrical and welding training . Due to the changes in the necessities of the communities and in an attempt to create a greater local economic sustainability, it has extended its range of subjects to include hydroponics, carpentry, brick making and others. This flexibility of the project allows it to be a nation wide project. Its repeated success since 1997 throughout the whole of South Africa is a measure of its replicability.

To ensure its success, the Lungisa project puts more emphasis on the after care programme. This ensures that graduates don’t flounder during their initial attempts to establish themselves in the market. This aspect is also easily replicated and guarantees its success.

To achieve success in any project, things have to be done one step at the time and only when the investor is comfortable with one objective can the project move onto the next step. In the case of Lungisa, the project has been running for 5 years now and only recently did the project decide that it was time to use what was learnt during that lifetime and to take the next steps and face the news challenged. Two of the more neglected groups are the women and disabled people. Lungisa’s recent challenges have been to overcome the perception that women cannot become competent at the electrical repair and dedicate more attention and funds to their training as well as of disabled people.

Lungisa main goal is to provide the community affected by the project with a better quality of life. However, to reach this goal it has used a simple yet innovative approach. It focused on a specific market that exists almost everywhere and which skills are necessary yet not abundant - electric repairs and welding. To achieve this, only communities that used electricity were chosen for the project. Furthermore, to create a bigger effect on the community’s development, only unemployed South African Citizens between the age of 25 and 45 and with a minimum of Std. 8 or the equivalent in Mathematics were illegible.

Additionally, Lungisa provides an aftercare programme where regular meetings are held and graduates give feedback on their business and financial performance. These meeting also serve as demonstrations by suppliers of household appliances. By presenting their various products in detail, the successful entrepreneurs are given the opportunity of selling new products.

These approaches are not innovative in their singularity, however their adequate mixture has resulted into a highly successful project.

Lungisa is a changing organisation. It is modifying its services in response to new insights and merging needs of the South African society. By focusing on the unemployed or unemployable at the margins of poverty and giving them the skills to help themselves emerge as a self supporting members of the society while at the same time providing services that the society learns, Lungisa has made a major contribution to South Africa over the years. It’s success should in itself be a source of inspiration to other projects.

There are three types of partnerships in this project. The first type of partnership is between the investors and the project. The Lungisa project receives funding from a different number of private stakeholders such as ABB South Africa, Eskom, Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, Alpha Ltd, Power Technologies Limited, Defy, Nu-World Industries and Old Mutual, among others. These investors not only contribute with financial support but they also contribute through expertise, training staff support and supply of materials that the trainees need such is the case of ABB-SA

The second type of partnership involves the Local and National Government and the Project. This project not only receives the support of the local authorities but it also gets funding from the Department of Labour. This support is seen through the usage of Lungisa as a model for the Department of Correctional Services in the introduction of similar courses to help inmates to find jobs on their release.

The third type of partnership is the most important one because it involves the community and the project. Without the community support in facilitating the setting up of the course and their willingness to participate in the course, the project would have failed. This type of partnership changes every time the course moves from area to area thus being of a delicate nature. Nevertheless, the project’s success indicates that the project is widely accepted.