Tertiary-educated adults in South Africa

This indicator measures the share of adults aged 25 to 64 with tertiary education. Tertiary education covers qualifications beyond upper secondary school, including short-cycle tertiary programmes, bachelor’s degrees, master’s degrees and doctoral degrees. In the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) 2011, tertiary education covers ISCED levels 5 to 8.
Tertiary-educated adults provide a broad measure of a country’s advanced skills base. As economies become more knowledge-intensive and technology changes the nature of work, higher-level qualifications can support access to more specialised occupations and better labour-market opportunities, although the benefits are not uniform and differ across fields of study and national labour-market conditions.