The National Research Foundation (NRF) has achieved a broad-based black economic empowerment (BBBEE) Level 1 rating – a year earlier than the NRF board-approved target of reaching Level 2 by 2025.

“We are incredibly proud of this milestone. Such an outcome is the result of a focussed and dedicated strategy achieved through extensive work premised on making a meaningful impact in society,” says NRF CFO Bishen Singh.

The NRF is required by the BBBEE Act to report yearly to the BBBEE Commission on its status and BBBEE audit outcome. The organisation deliberately set out on this trajectory about five years ago, at a time when it was at Level 7.

The NRF says the Level 1 achievement follows its focus on the implementation of the NRF Strategy 2025, which is anchored on transformation, impact, excellence and sustainability.

The strategy encompasses the NRF’s ‘Supply Chain Transformation 2025’, another critical strategic and policy document that details the organisation’s transformative procurement framework.

The NRF says the implementation of this strategy proved important towards its BBBEE Level 1 rating achievement. One of the strategy’s core objectives focuses on the sustainable development and empowerment of local black businesses.

“It underscores the importance of not only increasing procurement from enterprises that are 51% or more black-owned, but also contributing to their development and upskilling.

“Commitment to enterprise and supplier development as well as socioeconomic development are key elements to achieving the BBBEE Level 1 rating, so are organisational ownership, management and skills development,” the NRF says.

The NRF’s achievement is reflective of its directed transformational objectives on procurement and upskilling, it adds.

Further, the NRF says it has increased the number of women leaders within its ranks in order to impact positively on the management control element.

The NRF currently has nine women board members out of 15; two women in the organisation’s corporate executive structure; and three women managing directors of the South African Agency for Science and Technology Advancement (NRF-Saasta), the South African Environmental Observation Network and the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory, all being NRF research facilities.

The NRF also provides work opportunities for unemployed youth through the Youth Employment Service programme.

This 12-month programme, run by NRF-Saasta in collaboration with the Department of Science, Technology and Innovation, provides young people with practical training; exposure and skills to help them enter the job market.

The NRF is currently hosting its third cohort under this programme. The NRF says over 80 youth have so far been given work exposure opportunities through this programme.

“We remain committed to the Transformation Agenda in line with the country’s National Development Plan to reduce poverty, inequality, and unemployment. The efforts of the Supply Chain Transformation Committee and all internal stakeholders who have dedicated their time, effort and expertise to the realisation of this vision are lauded,” says Singh.