When is a Toyota education college not a Toyota education college?
When it’s a business school. It may bear the company name, but, says executive director Justin Barnes, the Toyota Wessels Institute for Manufacturing Studies (Twims) is operationally independent of the Japanese motor company.
The most important word in the name is "manufacturing". The Durban-based school, which opened in late 2018 and began teaching this year, exists to raise the level of manufacturing knowledge and management across Africa.
Executive education and short courses are run by Barnes and his team of lecturers. The MBA and introductory postgraduate diploma are taught on the Kloof campus by the University of Pretoria’s Gordon Institute of Business Science (Gibs).
"When they’re in residence, this is a Gibs campus," says Barnes.
Core courses follow the standard Gibs MBA but electives are all manufacturing-based. They focus on four main themes: lean manufacturing; green manufacturing; future manufacturing; and African trade and industrialisation.
There’s no denying the need for such emphasis. Sub-Saharan Africa has a limited industrial base that has shrunk further in recent years. SA is one of many countries where deindustrialisation has taken hold but is now trying to reverse the trend.
"We’re consumption-based, but that’s not how you develop an economy," says Barnes. "Most of the world sees Africa as a market, but we have to find a way to make what we need. We need industrialisation."
That, and the skills to enable it. In the modern world, manufacturing is no longer a desirable career for many people. "It’s often seen as a dirty task," says Barnes. "We have to raise the status, the gravitas. We have to make it appealing."
The government hopes other industries, with policy support, can replicate the success of the SA motor industry in attracting foreign investment and becoming an export-focused manufacturing base. SA motor companies, with government support, are also encouraging other countries to join them in a pan-African industry.
Barnes has played a lead role in devising policy for the automotive industry, as well as for the clothing and textile sectors.
Toyota SA, through its education trust, has so far sunk R130m into Twims — R60m to buy and refurbish the colonial-style campus building that was once the home of a sugar baron, and R70m for educational endowments. There will be 10 annual MBA scholarships, starting in 2020.
However, Barnes stresses that that is the limit of Toyota’s involvement. "In terms of course content and academic autonomy, we are completely independent. We are not here to promote Toyota or serve its interests."
That message may not yet be clear. Attempts to draw students from other motor companies have so far failed. Twims, however, is not just about the automotive sector but about manufacturing in general. It hopes to draw students from several industries.
The institute can take up to 40 MBA students annually but this year signed up only 18. Barnes says marketing was underfunded and started late, but he expects numbers to pick up from 2020. "In retrospect, I’m glad we fell short of our target," he says.
"Our experience so far shows we wouldn’t have been ready for a full complement."
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