Human resource development

People who are highly qualified serve as a critical resource in building up a knowledge society. Lor and Britz (2000) describe a knowledge society as a society which is pre- occupied with knowledge production, distribution and use supported by a high level of education and use of modern ICTs. Nowadays a country will gain a competitive edge at global level, if it makes investments in the production of knowledge. Smith (2003:443) considers human resource development as the enhancement of people‟s competencies related to work. It could be competencies of people operating as individuals or groups or in an organisation. The focus is on people acquiring the knowledge, understanding, skills and training that will improve their performance. Society is also required to possess some level of information literacy in order for individuals to access information and be able to utilise it. Lor and Britz (2007:395) observe that a deliberate effort must be made when developing human resources to include people from across society including women and the underprivileged groups to be in line with the principle of equal opportunities for all. They assert that human resource development becomes effective if it is considered as a continuous process to enhance knowledge and skills in the rapid changing environment.

56 2.4.1.1 Education and training

Education and training are essential components of capacity building. Different sectors in any economy rely on a good education system to produce the necessary human resources a country needs for its competitive advantage in the global economy. Education and training facilitate access to knowledge and its utilisation. The importance of human resource development is well recognised by governments, private sector, associations and individuals. At national level governments have established ministries and departments responsible for education and training at various levels and have gone further to develop policies on human resources development (Smith, 2003:444). Professional bodies at national and international levels have also laid emphasis on and facilitated continuing professional education for their members. For instance IFLA recognises the importance of continuing professional development and workplace learning as evidenced by the establishment of a unit responsible for promoting continuing education and workplace learning programmes at an international level. This is against the realization that there are new changes taking place in societies which directly affect libraries and information services. It has therefore become necessary that experts working in libraries and the entire information sector upgrade their skills, knowledge and abilities in order to respond and cope with such rapid and diverse changes (Smith, 2003:443).

However, literature indicates that in Africa emphasis is on formal education with little attention to informal education. The setback with formal education as observed by Ondari-Okemwa (2004:371) is that it only takes care of a small proportion of people leaving out the majority of the citizenry. In addition, most countries in Africa have put

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basic education as a priority (Stamm and Knuth, 2010). This is also true for Malawi where the current statement of the National Education Sector Plan for 2008 to 2017 highlights basic education as the main strategic priority area (MoEST, 2008). However, the plan has defined basic education to include early childhood development, non- formal education (out-of-school youth, adult literacy and complimentary basic education) and primary school education. This is a global concept which the Ministry has now adopted to replace the old understanding Malawi had that basic education meant primary school education only (MoEST, 2008). The ministry has broadened up the sphere of basic education so that more people who were originally left out are accommodated. However, the approach taken in the plan may end up turning non- formal education into formal education. The approach proposes to use the same curriculum used for formal primary school education but with a reduced number of years one has to undergo through non-formal education.

Training of human resources in Malawi in the information sector has not followed any consolidated policy in the absence of a national information policy. Training policies in the sector have been developed at institutional level. For instance Lead Associates (2011) acknowledge that there is no government-wide IT human resources development plan for Malawi. In addition, policies developed so far have not stressed on training. The Communications Sector Policy of 1998 and the Rural Telecommunications Policy of 2002 have not laid any emphasis on training and development of human resources. Where it has been mentioned, it is part of the commercialisation process of government entities focusing on marketing and customer care. However, the draft ICT policy has highlighted human resources development in

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ICTs as one of its strategic elements. Nonetheless University of Malawi has programmes at Bachelor‟s degree level in computer science, information technology, electronics and telecommunication engineering and Master‟s degree programmes in informatics and computer science (University of Malawi, 2012: online). Mzuzu University has programmes at Bachelor‟s degree level in library and information science, Information and Communication Technology and a Master‟s degree programme in information theory coding and cryptography (Mzuzu university, 2012:online). National College of Information Technology (NACIT) under DISTMIS also offers diploma and degree courses in information technology (Malawi government, 2012:online). The Malawi Library Association is also offering a certificate course in Library and Information Science (Uta, 2005). The researcher believes that the formulation of a national information policy would consolidate the various initiatives on the development of capacities to generate and access knowledge through formal and informal education.

2.4.1.2 Information literacy

Studies have shown that countries that have included information literacy in their school curriculum have developed societies with lifelong skills for accessing and utilizing information to generate knowledge (Enakrire and Onyenania, 2007). Information literacy entails: recognizing the need for information and how to satisfy the need; acquiring skills to conduct a search and accessing information using ICTs; acquiring competencies to appraise and be able to select accurate and reliable information from different sources and; acquiring competencies to organize and exploit information to generate new knowledge out of it (Ameen and Gorman, 2008:102; Nassimbeni and de Jager, 2000:194; Kavulya, 2003:219).

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Developed countries came up with policies to introduce information literacy in their school curricula in order to improve information literacy further. On the contrary, students in Malawi at different levels still struggle with issues regarding information services provided by libraries and other sources like the Internet. Information literacy has not been included in the school curriculum in Malawi as evidenced by the large incidents of students who are not able to access and utilise available information sources and resources (Enakrire and Onyenania, 2007). Studies conducted at a number of African universities including the University of Malawi on access to subscribed on-line databases, confirm the low level of information literacy among students and staff leading to underutilization of digital resources (Ameen and Gorman, 2008:100; Harle, 2010:24-26). Harle (2010) carried out a case study investigating researchers‟ access to the latest academic information, in the form of refereed journals and other scholarly materials, in Eastern and Southern African Universities comprising University of Malawi, University of Nairobi, National University of Rwanda and University of Dare-salaam. Harle used questionnaires, face-to-face interviews and desk research to collect data for the study. Data were collected from 240 researchers and 23 librarians. The study revealed that researchers and students had inadequate competencies to effectively use e-resources. They didn‟t have skills to search and explore databases, and to successfully access and download full-text articles from the databases. Many researchers were also not aware of the titles they could access through their libraries. This meant that valuable resources the universities had subscribed to were not optimally used (Harle, 2010:viii). For university students it is essential that they acquire high level of information literacy to enhance their competitive

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edge in society. It is therefore, not surprising that many universities in Africa continue adopting the use of ICTs to manage and access information in their libraries. Information literacy programs at university take the form of: library orientation, library instructions offered on demand when the learner wants skills to use them, and reference services. A few universities have introduced compulsory undergraduate courses where students are taught information skills for lifelong learning. For instance at University of Cape Town in South Africa where the School of Librarianship negotiated with the faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities to offer a single semester course to undergraduates on „Information society tools and skills‟ in order to impart information skills to students for lifelong learning (Nassimbeni and de Jager, 2000);and at University of Nairobi, Kenyatta University and Catholic University of Eastern Africa in Kenya where undergraduate students are taught „Communication Skills Course‟ in order to instill skills relating to library, reading and writing (Kavulya, 2003). Information literacy empowers students with lifelong skills for locating and handling information searches on their own and be able to manage their learning even beyond the formal education system as students move into society to assume different responsibilities (Kavulya, 2003:216-220). Malawi must seriously consider putting up policies that lay emphasis on skills development besides infrastructure, if the country is to develop into a knowledge society. Ameen and Gorman (2008:106) in a study which explored the state of information and digital literacy in developing countries and how it affects national development using Pakistan as a case study found that most government policies are laying heavy emphasis on ICT infrastructure with little regard on competencies to use the resources. The researcher feels that Malawi government needs to deal with skills

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deficiency through policy interventions that will aim at introducing information literacy in the school curriculum. Information literacy is one of the elements of a national information policy.