Ndebele urges UK to invest in SA
Chris Khumalo
17 November 2004
KwaZulu-Natal Premier Sbu Ndebele on Tuesday urged British business to invest both in his province and in South Africa, saying the country is a stable destination for foreign investment.
Ndebele was addressing the British captains of industry and potential investors to South Africa during the launch of the "Investing in South Africa" publication in London.
Discussing KwaZulu-Natal, Ndebele painted a picture of a province that was once trapped in violence while the entire country was surging forward after the 1994 democratic elections.
"But, just when everybody had given up on KwaZulu-Natal, the ordinary people of the province came together and proclaimed that they were tired of violence and they wanted peace.
"They had realised that in other provinces work to reconstruct and develop was underway and they were getting left behind.
"They had come to the realisation that peace and stability were pre-conditions for development
and prosperity," he said.
KwaZulu-Natal, he said, just like South Africa was characterised by two parallel economies.
Of the 9.6 million people in KwaZulu-Natal, only 2.86 million were defined as being economically active, he said.
"While state intervention is necessary to address this challenge, there is a need for foreign investment to flow into our province in order to bridge the existing gap and to exploit the opportunities created by this scenario while helping to address the problem," he said.
He described the strengths of the province as the two largest harbours in South Africa - Durban and Richards Bay.
"In fact, Durban is the busiest hub port in Africa, handling 55 million tons of cargo per year while Richards Bay specialises in bulk exports.
"If South Africa is the gateway to Africa, then KwaZulu-Natal is the gateway to the rest of South Africa and the Southern African Development Community countries," he said.
Ndebele said for the
province to realise its goal of being a winning province it needed the support of business, especially international investors.
Talking about South Africa, he said the country, having worked its way towards being one of the major countries as a voice of authority in Africa, was a gateway to Africa.
He told investors that the Department of Trade and Industry was finalising its four designated industrial development zones that were designed to accommodate foreign investors.
These zones were located in Richards Bay, the Johannesburg International Airport, and the Coega Deepwater Port.
"However, our government has also announced that a suite of new investment incentives totaling more than R500-million has been allocated for investment incentive programmes in the current financial year.
"These will focus mainly on small and medium Enterprises Development Programme, the Skills Support Programme, the Critical Infrastructure Programme and the Strategic Industrial
Programme.
South African exporters, he said, would be assisted through the R200-million allocated to the Export Credit Insurance Corporation, while R112-million would be made available to exporters via the Export Marketing and Investment Assistance.
Source: BuaNews
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