Sydney Mufamadi at the launch of the Nodal Economic Profiles in Birchwood
Conference Centre, Boksburg
11 October 2007
Programme director
Deputy Minister Nomatyala Hangana
Honourable MECs
Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee
Distinguished guests
Ladies and gentlemen:
In 2001, government formally launched two initiatives, the Integrated
Sustainable Rural Development Programme and the Urban Renewal Programme. The
aim of these two programmes is to systematically work towards overcoming the
problem of poverty and underdevelopment in 21 identified districts and
townships.
The uneven development outcomes that manifest themselves in the endemic
poverty which afflicts these nodal municipalities was decisively shaped by
government policy. It is apartheid spatial planning which left us saddled with
such an overwhelming number of economically derelict areas.
Today we meet to launch yet another milestone in the ongoing national effort
to transform our country into a better place for our people to live and work
in. This step signals our commitment to strive unremittingly to reverse the
legacy of marginalisation and exclusion.
Progress in the Nodes
According to the impact assessment studies conducted in 2006, these two
programmes have contributed significantly to the fast tracking of service
delivery and changing the lives of the people for the better. For instance, in
Maluti-a-Phofung, in the Free State province, backlogs in water, sanitation and
electricity have been halved between 2001 and 2006. There are 46 000 new water
connections and 30 000 new electricity connections.
In the Alfred Nzo district municipality in the Eastern Cape, 69 percent of
households now benefit from free basic water provision and the number of
households with access to free basic electricity has improved from 5 to 33
percent - all this, in the space of two years, from 2003 to 2005. Another
feature of achievement in the Nodes is the Local Economic Development (LED)
projects which have since taken off. However, these are not delivering jobs at
a large scale. Most of the jobs are created through the infrastructure
investment programme.
The case for sustainable local economic development
Ladies and gentlemen, the progress we have realised so far, limited as it
is, is actually very impressive given the fairly short order in which it was
made. However, it leaves us seized with an ambivalent feeling: a mixture of
celebration and trepidation. Clearly, for as long as these local spaces remain
characterised by low or almost non-existent levels of economic productivity,
there can be no sustainable livelihoods to speak of.
This then is the context in which the collaborative effort between
government and the Business Trust was born. As government and business, it is
in our common interest to pay attention to the task of redressing the
structural imbalances in our national economy. These internal imbalances are
reflected in part, in the fact that the growth of domestic demand remains
subdued, relative to the growth of potential and actual output. It is a problem
which cannot be allowed to persist, given its dire macro-economic
implications.
Programme director, sustainable economic development requires the necessary
co-presence of two interrelated sets of conditions:
Firstly, a growth perspective which is shared by a wide spectrum of
leadership across all sectors.
Secondly, the interactive effects between localised growth factors and the
strategic needs of trans-local actors.
The Economic Profiles we are launching today provide us with the necessary
ingredients for success in this regard. They give us a sense of how these rural
and urban nodes feature in the national spatial perspective. They also
communicate a message that for these areas to realise their potential, a
variety of extra local resources will need to be mobilised. It behoves all of
us: government in its various spheres, non-governmental organizations including
the private sector, to locate this initiative within the national agenda of
boosting productivity. The question before us is not whether, but how, should
these nodes feature in a projected 6 percent headline growth.
I am informed that the Business Trust has launched the "Shared-Growth
Initiative" which aims to assist the municipalities to manage projects that
will be rolled out as a direct outgrowth of the nodal economic profiling
exercise. Together with Project Consolidate, the Business Trust initiative will
reinforce the available skills, set and encourage ongoing accumulation of
managerial know-how.
These profiles therefore, must be seen as a mobilising instrument. They will
help us to mobilise government-wide resources and direct them towards the
achievement of the goal of sustainable service delivery and economic
development.
On behalf of the Ministry and the Department of Provincial and Local
Government, I would like to thank all those who contributed to make this
project possible. For guiding the endeavour from the inception to the
completion of the work, special thanks are due to the Chief Executive Officer
of Business Trust, Mr Brian Whittacker.
The staff of Business Trust and officials are thanked for their
co-ordination of the project and facilitation of continued co-operation between
all stakeholders
No words are adequate to give full expression to our indebtedness to the
poll-bearers of our national effort to banish poverty and underdevelopment. The
best way to express our appreciation is to emerge with decisions that will help
us to give effect to the vision which gave rise to these profiles, may your
deliberations be crowned with success.
Thank You.
Issued by: Department of Provincial and Local Government
11 October 2007
Source: Department of Provincial and Local Government (http://www.dplg.gov.za)
