The Steel and Engineering Industries Federation of Southern Africa (SEIFSA) has formally tabled proposals on behalf of its 23 employer associations and responded to each of the unions’ proposals submitted for the upcoming wage negotiations.

SEIFSA received in excess of 160 demands from the unions. “Under the current economic climate, employers firmly believe that current employment conditions for employees are favourable and that we are not in a position to further improve employment conditions to increasingly unaffordable and uncompetitive levels,” said SEIFSA Operations Director Lucio Trentini. He said that SEIFSA-affiliated employers’ responses to proposals presented by the trade unions have taken into account the possible impact of wage demands on the sector’s ability to retain and create jobs and the total cost of employment.

Trentini was speaking at the pre wage negotiations conference in Benoni, marking the start of the metals and engineering wage negotiations, following the expiry of the three-year wage agreement concluded in 2011. The themes that employers in associations affiliated to SEIFSA tabled include an up-front commitment from the trade unions to a facilitated peace accord highlighting adherence to sound industrial relations principles and practices and, when required, public denunciation of acts of intimidation, destruction and/or damage to property and violence.

SEIFSA Industrial Relations Executive Gordon Angus said that the primary focus of employers represented by SEIFSA is the survival and growth of the industry, the retention of jobs and the urgent need to implement measures aimed at creating sustainable employment opportunities.

“Looking at the current realities, the sector’s output is 20% below the 2007 levels, and in 2013 employment in the metals and engineering industry is estimated to have grown by a mere 1%. The sector’s overall capacity utilisation has continued to dwindle below 75%. Without capacity utilisation, employment is certain to drop,” said SEIFSA economist Taffie Chibanguza.

The federation’s Chief Executive Officer, Kaizer Nyatsumba, concluded that a constructive approach that seeks to advance the interests of the industries is required. “We appeal for a win-win approach to the negotiations, as opposed to a winner-takes-all approach. After all, our democracy, whose twentieth anniversary we celebrate this year, was itself a product of compromise.”