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The future of universities – Prof Burger part of DHET Expert Panel on University Fees

17 June 2025 | Story Lacea Loader | Photo Supplied

Prof Philippe Burger, Dean: Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences at the University of the Free State (UFS), has been appointed as a member of a team that will represent Universities South Africa (USAf) in a DHET Expert Panel on University Fees. The panel, which comprises representatives from USAf, the DHET, and NSFAS, focuses on the affordability of tuition fees and the future sustainability of the sector, looking at potential solutions for tuition fees beyond the 2025 academic year.

With more than 30 years of experience in higher education, mostly in management positions, Prof Burger understands the sector well. Combined with his expertise in macroeconomics, fiscal policy, and public sector economics and finance, he is uniquely positioned to make a significant contribution to this task team.

Universities matter

Despite the high national unemployment rate (32%), Prof Burger points out that unemployment is largely a problem of the unskilled. “The unemployment rate of people with university degrees is about 12%, much lower than the national average,” he notes. “South Africa has a large shortage of skilled labour, which it needs to grow the economy and improve lives.” He trusts that universities can fill this void, in addition to providing the thought leaders needed to take the country forward.

Although universities in South Africa are experiencing financial pressures, they continue to lift thousands of people to better lives each year. Universities make a profoundly positive contribution to the country and its population, and Prof Burger believes that once the public is fully aware of this, it will support broader discussions in favour of higher education.

The challenge

Universities face several cost pressures that are causing an increase in cost at a higher rate than consumer inflation, Prof Burger explains. “For instance, we buy equipment, software, and journal subscriptions that are all priced in US dollars. Affected by the exchange rate, these types of expenses have increased by much more than the price of consumer goods in South Africa over the past ten years.” According to Prof Burger, increased operational costs, coupled with constrained university income, necessitate a model that will provide universities with enough income to cover their costs while delivering quality education in the long run.

The solution

“There is an argument for universities to become more efficient, and there is certainly room for universities to look at their cost structures, but there is also a limit to what we can do,” Prof Burger says. “It is important to stress that we cannot talk about the sustainability of universities and not contextualise it within a framework that seeks to deliver quality learning, teaching, and research. In the absence of that quality, we will not be able to address the skills shortages and thought leadership that the country needs. And that is the sustainability we need to talk about – the sustainability of quality education and scholarship,” he concludes.

News Archive

UFS scientists involved in groundbreaking research to protect rhino horns

2010-07-27

Pictured from the left are: Prof. Paul Grobler (UFS), Prof. Antoinette Kotze (NZG) and Ms. Karen Ehlers (UFS).
Photo: Supplied

Scientists at the University of the Free State (UFS) are involved in a research study that will help to trace the source of any southern white rhino product to a specific geographic location.

This is an initiative of the National Zoological Gardens of South Africa (NZG).

Prof. Paul Grobler, who is heading the project in the Department of Genetics at the UFS, said that the research might even allow the identification of the individual animal from which a product was derived. This would allow law enforcement agencies not only to determine with certainty whether rhino horn, traded illegally on the international black market, had its origin in South Africa, but also from which region of South Africa the product came.

This additional knowledge is expected to have a major impact on the illicit trade in rhino horn and provide a potent legal club to get at rhino horn smugglers and traders.

The full research team consists of Prof. Grobler; Christiaan Labuschagne, a Ph.D. student at the UFS; Prof. Antoinette Kotze from the NZG, who is also an affiliated professor at the UFS; and Dr Desire Dalton, also from the NZG.

The team’s research involves the identification of small differences in the genetic code among white rhino populations in different regions of South Africa. The genetic code of every species is unique, and is composed of a sequence of the four nucleotide bases G, A, T and C that are inherited from one generation to the next. When one nucleotide base is changed or mutated in an individual, this mutated base is also inherited by the individual's progeny.

If, after many generations, this changed base is present in at least 1% of the individuals of a group, it is described as a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP), pronounced "snip". Breeding populations that are geographically and reproductively isolated often contain different patterns of such SNPs, which act as a unique genetic signature for each population.

The team is assembling a detailed list of all SNPs found in white rhinos from different regions in South Africa. The work is done in collaboration with the Pretoria-based company, Inqaba Biotech, who is performing the nucleotide sequencing that is required for the identification of the SNPs.

Financial support for the project is provided by the Advanced Biomolecular Research cluster at the UFS.

The southern white rhino was once thought to be extinct, but in a conservation success story the species was boosted from an initial population of about 100 individuals located in KwaZulu-Natal at the end of the 19th century, to the present population of about 15 000 individuals. The southern white rhino is still, however, listed as “near threatened” by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

Media Release:
Mangaliso Radebe
Assistant Director: Media Liaison
Tel: 051 401 2828
Cell: 078 460 3320
E-mail: radebemt@ufs.ac.za
27 July 2010

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