Brand South Africa calls for strengthened partnerships to boost job creation
A key aspect of South Africa’s National Development Plan, the blueprint for creating sustainable growth and development in the country, is its emphasis on the power of public-private-partnerships (PPPs), says Brand South Africa’s Chief Marketing Officer, Mrs Linda Magapatona-Sangaret.
Statistics South Africa recently released a quarterly labour force survey, which shows that the unemployment rate rose to 27.2% from 26.7% in the first three months of this financial year. Commenting on these statistics Magapatona-Sangaret said: “Economic growth, job creation and poverty alleviation are immense challenges that the government cannot meet alone. Public-private partnerships serve as one of the viable solutions in addressing this challenge as they are a catalyst for economic growth in South Africa”.
“Our country’s strong capital markets, vibrant economic policies, stable political climate, a competitive private sector, proud democracy and a robust economic outlook, put us in the ultimate position to enhance effective partnerships between public and private sectors for employment creation.”
Following President Ramaphosa’s State of the Nation address, Economic Development Minister Ebrahim Patel defined the four key areas which are addressed and inspired by PPPs; transfer of skills, exposure to work, job creation and entrepreneurial activity.
In 2015, the World Bank commissioned a benchmarking study ‘The 2015 Infrascope’ carried out by the Economist Intelligence Unit that evaluated the capacity of African countries to implement sustainable and efficient PPPs. South Africa scored highest overall in all. Factors favouring South Africa, versus its peers on the African continent, is that it has PPP-specific laws and policies, sufficient financial market depth to fully enable PPP financing and National Treasury as an established central unit coordinating and approving PPPs.
The unemployment rate was reported to have jumped 0.5% to 27.2% in the second quarter of 2018, which equates to 6.1 million unemployed South Africans who are looking for work. The jobless rate had remained unchanged at 26.7% in the first three months of the year and the end of 2017.
“We are all collectively responsible for doing our part when it comes to job creation in South Africa; the everyday citizen needs to prepare themselves with the appropriate education and direction to succeed when opportunity arises, the business owner needs check out the struggles of the people around him/her and be open to new business ideas, and the government and private sector need to strengthen collaborative efforts for the best interests of the South African people. We need to create an honest assessment of where we are and also where we want to be as a country. From there, we can envision genuine economic progress for the future,” concluded Magapatona-Sangaret.
