Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan's medium term budget statement did not sufficiently deal with details and specifics in respect of education, the National Professional Teachers' Organisation of South Africa (Naptosa) said on Wednesday.

"Whilst acknowledging the constraints imposed by the present economic climate, the minister was almost silent on education, other than stating that education, along with health, job creation, rural development and crime, would be one of the focus areas for government," Naptosa president Ezra Ramasehla said in a statement.

He said the references to education in the minister's statement did not reflect the sentiment that education had, yet again, been identified as a priority area.

"Naptosa does welcome the statement that 5.5 million children would benefit from additional expenditure allocated for developing literacy in the foundation phase," he said.

He said it was important to allocate resources where they were most needed — for the first years of schooling, in order for pupils in South Africa to benefit optimally from being in the public education system.

"We appreciates that it is the very young who have been prioritised and believe that this investment will have long term benefits for the country."

The organisation also welcomed the intention to reach 8.6 million children in the schools nutrition programme and that the age for recipients of child support grants would be extended to the age of 18.

Ramasehla said the increase in the education budget from R140-billion in 2009 to R185-billion in 2012/13 was welcomed, but it was not clear whether education would receive a fair share of the R40-billion that would be given to provinces.

He explained that education would have to compete with health and the provision of housing for the money.

"Provinces will allocate these funds differently and the spending, per learner, in the provinces is likely to remain very unequal. This impacts on the way in which schools are resourced..."

He said the organisation strongly supported the provision of an extra R2.4-billion to promote skills development through creating apprenticeships.

However, it was not clear where these apprenticeships would be offered and whether the intention was for the FET colleges, in the public education and training system, to be capacitated to meet this need.

Ramasehla said the minister was also silent on the need for reducing class sizes, the building of classrooms, the provision of water and electricity to schools and the provision of funding for the occupation specific dispensation.