In terms of the Pharmacy Act (53 of 1974, Section 3), the South African Pharmacy Council (hereafter referred to as Council) is responsible for establishing, developing, maintaining and controlling universally acceptable standards in pharmaceutical education and training. Council implements the above responsibilities by developing scopes of practice and qualifications, accrediting providers and courses, quality assuring the delivery of the programmes, and ensuring consistency and quality across programmes.

Higher education and training in the South African context falls within the National Qualifications Framework (NQF) [Government Gazette No. 30353: The Higher Education Qualifications Framework (HEQF), the Higher Education Act, 1997 (Act No. 101 of 1997)]. The specific levels in the framework which apply to pharmacy education and training are:

Council’s main responsibility is to protect, promote and maintain the health, safety and wellbeing of members of the public. The implementation of this responsibility is aligned with the relevant regulations.

The purpose of Good Pharmacy Education Standards (GPE) is to ensure quality pharmaceutical education in South Africa. GPE must prescribe excellence in education to ensure that pharmacists and pharmacy support staff practising in South Africa are equipped for the roles they have to undertake in practice and that their performance complies with the Exit Level Outcomes (ELOs) specified for the various qualifications. In complying with GPE, education and training providers will enable learners to achieve the desired level of competence.

The standards set out in this document provide benchmarks to guide the development, implementation and quality assurance of programmes leading to higher education and training (HET) qualifications in pharmacy. The main aim of a national set of standards, as mandated by the Council on Higher Education (CHE), is not to displace existing, internal means of quality control over qualifications, but to provide for an agreed matrix of benchmarks against which organisational assessment criteria and awards can be evaluated.

The standards which follow have been drawn up from the most up-to-date international standards to reflect these responsibilities. They are also in line with the policy on Good Pharmacy Education Practice of the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP), in collaboration with the World Health Organisation (WHO), which identified the ‘eight star pharmacist’ with the following roles and responsibilities:

GPE and other relevant standards which were identified and critically reviewed included those of Australia, New Zealand, Ireland (the Pharmacy Education and Accreditation Reviews (PEARs) project), United Kingdom (General Pharmaceutical Council and General Medical Council – Tomorrow’s Doctors), United States of America (Accreditation Council for Pharmaceutical Education), Egypt, India and South Africa.

The GPE applies to existing and new programmes and additional sites for presentation.