THE UITENHAGE Self Employment Centre (USEC) on has been granted a R500 000 donation (Euro 50 000) from the Lower Saxony Government in Germany for the start-up of a Multi-Skilled Builder Development Programme. The donation has been supported by Uitenhage-based Volkswagen South Africa, and brings to R650 000 the amount set aside as part of the vocational skills development programme being initiated by USEC. The Uitenhage Self Employment Centre (USEC) was established as an independent entity in 1997 after it was started as a pre-employment centre by Volkswagen three years before. It has as its focus disadvantaged youth, women and unemployed or retrenched workers from both urban and rural communities. On receiving the donation, Nafeesa Dinie, Centre Manager and Director of USEC said people development was a core stimulant for economic activity particularly in the Uitenhage area where unemployment was excessively high. "Part of our community building initiative is to focus on creating vocational opportunities for young people to build their skills in a variety of fields in order to enter formal employment, continue to develop under a learnership programme or pursue self-employment opportunities," said Dinie. "The skills acquired in phase one of our "Multi-Skilled Builder" development programme will provide about 60 people with an option that was never within reach for them in the past. This will contribute to the Nelson Mandela Metropole (Port Elizabeth-Uitenhage-Despatch) and local job creation initiatives. The programme will offer different skills in the construction sector related to the construction of the low income housing development model. The training programme will contain elements like foundation and flooring, bricklaying, plastering, carpentry, plumbing, domestic electrical and painting. The participants will receive experiential training under the auspices of qualified instructors who will act as "project leaders" for the duration of the learning phase. We anticipate that they will receive exposure and opportunities to be involved with local community housing projects," she said.