South Africa has made substantial progress over the past decade in raising the proportion of doctoral graduates, but that progress has stalled in the past two years and the country remains well behind both its own policy targets and many comparable emerging economies.
The goal of the department of higher education & training (DHET) to increase the number of doctoral graduates in South Africa is driven by its view that they contribute to the advancement of knowledge, drive innovation and enhance national competitiveness.
And, as it notes in its 2025 fact sheet, Are We Producing Enough Doctoral Graduates in South Africa?, nations with a high proportion of doctoral graduates also tend to do more research & development (R&D), which fuels economic resilience and long-term growth.
According to DHET data on the public university sector, the number of doctoral graduates per million of the population increased from 39 in 2013 to peak at 61 per million in 2022, before slipping slightly to 58 in 2023.
This still represents a rise of almost 50% over the decade. However, it translated into the production of only 3,620 doctoral graduates in 2023 — well below the 5,000 needed annually to meet the National Development Plan target of 100 doctoral graduates per million by 2030.
South African universities produce internationally respected research and attract many international doctoral students, but the sector’s overall doctoral output remains relatively small.
The main constraint is not a lack of demand for PhDs, according to the DHET, but a combination of a narrow postgraduate pipeline (postgraduate enrolments accounted for only 15% of all university enrolments in 2023 compared to 16.2% a decade earlier), limited funding and a lack of supervisory capacity.
While the proportion of university academic staff holding doctorates rose from 41% in 2013 to 53% in 2023, according to the DHET, supervisory capacity has not expanded nearly as quickly as student demand. This limits the number of doctoral candidates that universities can supervise.
Morris Mthombeni, dean of the University of Pretoria’s Gordon Institute of Business Science, says the school accepted only a quarter of the 200 applications to begin business-related PhDs and doctorates in 2026. “Lack of supervisory capacity is the direct cause,” he says.
In addition, South Africa’s investment in R&D remains relatively low. This translates into fewer funded research projects, laboratories, doctoral scholarships and academic positions.
South Africa has a high PhD attrition rate mainly because many doctoral candidates study part-time, balancing employment with study, so completion times are relatively long (often five to seven years for part-time students) and funding frequently expires before completion.
The lack of financial incentives and career rewards for doctoral studies also plays a role in capping PhD enrolments, given that in many sectors the salary premium for holding a PhD is relatively modest outside academia. For many talented graduates, entering industry immediately after a master’s degree can be financially more attractive than spending several additional years pursuing doctoral studies.
Mthombeni notes that in some countries doctoral students are employed by their university or business school for the period of their research. A similar trend is unlikely in South Africa. The government already can’t afford the National Student Financial Aid Scheme for ordinary students. “How the hell will it pay for doctoral employees?” asks Mthombeni.
Nadia Matulich (29) is a junior economist who has just defended her PhD at Stellenbosch University after nearly five years of study. “You have to be in research for the love of it because, financially, doing a PhD is an irresponsible decision,” she says.
“Many of my friends in corporate roles make double what I do, and they left university after doing honours and master’s degrees. Salaries in academia are not what they are in industry and the only real benefit of getting a doctorate is when your goal is to be in a job that requires a PhD for career advancement.”
There’s also the time commitment. “You sacrifice time away from family and friends and give up most of your evenings, weekends and sleep. Unlike an undergraduate degree, it doesn’t happen in your early 20s, when everyone else is doing the same thing, and the returns on investment are not as substantial as a bachelor’s either.”
For all these reasons, South Africa’s doctoral output remains low by international standards. At just 0.2%, South Africa’s proportion of individuals aged 25 and older with a doctoral qualification remains significantly lower than the OECD average of 1.3%.
The emerging consensus is that sustained increases in postgraduate funding, stronger research capacity and opportunities and expanded supervision will be necessary if South Africa is to close the doctoral output gap between it and peer countries.
Lessons learnt by PhD students
Katrien Smuts (33), who is finalising her PhD in economics at Stellenbosch University, agrees that “a PhD is research, research and more research” and thus “only something you should do if you love research”.
“I worked and studied, which was especially challenging,” she says. “Doing a doctorate has been one of the most challenging yet rewarding things I have done in my life. The learning curve is steep, but the sense of achievement is great.”
Stacey-Lee Marais (40), a Capetonian who obtained her PhD in international economic and financial policy from the University of Szeged in Hungary (2021–2025), says she learnt five key lessons from the experience.
First, before embarking on a doctorate it is important to identify your purpose for doing so. For instance, how having it will enhance your career or professional profile.
Second, understand that doing a PhD is a full-time job. “My plan was to freelance during my PhD,” she says. “I did manage to do this, but only for 18 months. Then I was forced to pause taking on any more extra work because the time demands and cognitive load of doing my doctorate were just too great.”
Third, Marais urges prospective students not to underestimate the challenge: “I was tested and pushed to my limits — mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically. It’s a rollercoaster ride with incredible G-force!”
Hence, lesson number four: the need for a co-supervisor or, at the very least, a community of fellow doctoral students and professors to serve as sounding boards and provide support.
Last, Marais found “that the more digging you do into an area, the more you realise how much you don’t know about it. So, above all, be teachable; have an attitude of lifelong learning”.
Choosing between a DBA and a business PhD
Both a doctor of business administration (DBA) and a PhD in business are serious doctorates, but they do different work. Jon Foster-Pedley, dean and director of Henley Business School Africa, explains the difference between the two.
“A PhD drives narrow and deep, usually into a specialised academic question, and it’s largely a solo endeavour: one candidate, one supervisor, one long climb,” he says.
“A DBA takes the accumulated experience of senior practitioners and turns it into rigorous, tested frameworks. It’s done in a cohort of equals, which matters more than people expect. You research complexity alongside others who are living it.”
So, the DBA is for leaders who have reached the point where consuming other people’s knowledge is no longer enough. They want to investigate a consequential problem and produce an answer that improves practice.
“The benefit isn’t the title,” Foster-Pedley adds. “It’s the discipline of challenging your own assumptions at a level of complexity most executives never have to face.”
