Shaun Benton
21 September 2007
South Africa's relations with the United States have reached a point where the two countries can "agree to disagree" while still working together on common programmes, a senior Foreign Affairs official has told Parliament.
Briefing Parliament's portfolio committee on foreign affairs in Cape Town on Wednesday, the department's acting deputy director-general, Gert Grobler, described South Africa's relationship with the US as "comprehensive and constructive" in many sectors.
This did not imply that "differences of opinion in certain areas," Grobler said. "Our relationship is a constructive one, but remains a complicated and complex one that we have to work on all the time."
'Crucial' relationship
South Africa's relationship with the US is crucial, Grobler noted, pointing out that the US is the second-largest market for South African goods, with exports reaching R41-billion in 2006 - an R11-billion increase
from 10 years ago.
The value of imports from the US in 2006 amounted to R35-billion, leading to a balance of trade approximately R5-billion in South Africa's favour.
The US is also the second-largest foreign direct investor in South Africa after the United Kingdom. US investments had reached approximately US$5-billion (R35-billion) by December 2004, Grobler said, while there were between 120 and 130 US companies operating in the country.
Putting the size of the US economy into context, Grobler said the current US gross domestic product was about $13-trillion, with the country adding about $600-billion - equivalent to "one whole new Brazil or Australia" - to global economic output every year.
Closer ties
Grobler said the expansion of business, civilian and governmental links between the two countries had "grown exponentially" in recent years, while the number of US tourists visiting SA increased by 7.4% between 2005 and 2006, from
68 000 to over 73 000 visitors.
South Africa has also received about $255-million from the US President's Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (Pepfar) to fund projects in all nine provinces over the current financial year.
The US is also spending about $5-billion annually out of its Millennium Challenge Account, which Grobler said was making a "huge contribution" to development and technical assistance for a number of African countries.
Other US interventions targeting the continent include the $1-billion African Fund, the $55-million Woman Empowerment Initiative in Africa, and the African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa).
Strategic importance
Grobler told the MPs that South Africa was of major strategic importance for the US, given its advanced level of economic development and its influence on the continent.
The US-SA bilateral forum meets once a year and has a number of working groups, including one on human rights, Grobler added.
South Africa is pushing the US - as it is China - to help Africa with its productive capacity, most notably the increased value-addition or beneficiation of goods sourced on the continent. Such assistance would require a higher level of technology transfer and skills development, Grobler noted.
Source: BuaNews
