India-Brazil-South Africa Summit
12 September 2006
Pretoria - South African President Thabo Mbeki will later today Tuesday 12
September, depart South Africa for Brazil where he will lead a South African
government delegation including Minister of Foreign Affairs Dr. Nkosazana
Dlamini Zuma to the strategic trilateral Summit between India-Brazil and South
Africa scheduled for Wednesday 13 September in Brasilia.
The Summit will bring together for the first time within the context of
IBSA, the three Heads of State and Government President Mbeki and his Brazilian
and Indian counterparts President Lula da Silva and Prime Minister Dr Manmohan
Singh. Thus far, the main co-ordination of IBSA has been at Ministerial level
which saw three successful Ministerial meetings held in New Delhi in 2004, Cape
Town in 2005 and Rio de Janeiro early this year.
President Mbeki's visit to Brazil comes within the context of the need to
strengthen political, economic and trade relations between the three countries
with a view to advancing and consolidating South-South relations for increased
market and trade access.
President Mbeki's delegation includes Ministers Jeff Radebe, Mandisi
Mpahlwa, Buyelwa Sonjica, Director-General of Foreign Affairs, Dr Ayanda
Ntsaluba, senior government officials and a large business and trade
delegation.
The IBSA Summit of Heads of State and Government was preceded by a meeting
of the three respective Foreign Ministers in Brasilia held today, Tuesday12
September as part of preparations for the Summit. Minister Dlamini Zuma led the
South African delegation to the Ministerial segment of the Summit. In addition,
Tuesday also witnessed the launch of the IBSA Business Forum and the IBSA
Academic Seminar, which ran parallel to the Ministerial meeting.
Since its formation in 2003, IBSA has become instrumental in promoting
hitherto unseen closer coordination on global issues between South Africa,
India and Brazil particularly in the multilateral spheres such as the United
Nations (UN) and Word Trade Organisation (WTO) negotiations.
The IBSA Summit will culminate in the signing of a number of Agreements and
Memoranda of Understanding between the three countries including:
* Renewable Energies (Bio-fuels)
* Trade Facilitation for Standards, Technical Regulations and Conformity
Assessment
* Maritime Transportation
* Co-operation in Agriculture and Allied Fields
* Co-operation in the Information Society
Areas of trilateral cooperation that would receive special prominence during
the IBSA Summit discussions are:
* energy
* transport
* climate change
IBSA has a number of Sectoral Working Groups in other areas such as:
Agriculture; Culture; Defense, Education; Health; the Information Society;
Science and Technology; Social Development; Trade and Investment and Tourism
while other specialised sectoral Working Groups are under consideration.
The following IBSA funded projects - as part of poverty alleviation and
enhancing South-South cooperation - are currently underway via the IBSA
Facility Fund that is administered by the United Nations Development Fund's
(UNDP) South-South Unit in New York:
* Africa: Guinea-Bissau (Development of Agriculture and Cattle
Farming)
* Latin-America: Haiti (Collection of Solid Waste: A Tool to Reduce Violence
and Conflicts in Carrefour Feuilles)
* Asia: Laos (The proposed project has not reached implementation stage)
* A project of possible support to the Palestine National Authority is also
under consideration.
Bilateral trade statistics:
South Africa - Brazil (SA Rand)
2003
SA Exports to: 1 338 188 000
SA imports from: 5 343 996 000
Total trade: 6 682 184 000
2004
SA Exports to: 1 562 499 000
SA imports from: 6 413 675 000
Total trade: 7 976 174 000
2005
SA Exports to: 2 034 310 000
SA imports from: 8 341 326 000
Total trade: 10 375 636 000
2006
SA Exports to: 1 228 673 000
SA imports from: 3 984 405 000
Total trade: 5 213 078 000
South Africa - India (SA Rand)
2003
SA Exports to: 3 350 322 000
SA imports from: 3 126 148 000
Total trade: 6 476 470 000
2004
SA Exports to: 3 713 043 000
SA imports from: 4 547 261 000
Total trade: 8 260 304 000
2005
SA Exports to: 7 393 783 000
SA imports from: 7 029 784 000
Total trade: 14 423 567 000
2006
SA Exports to: 2 344 718 000
SA imports from: 3 899 165 000
Total trade: 6 243 883 000
2006: Period January to June 2006
Source: Department of Trade and Industry
Enquiries: Ronnie Mamoepa
Cell: 082 990 4853
Issued by: Department of Foreign Affairs
12 September 2006
Source: SAPA
