Speech by Naledi Pandor MP, Minister of Science and Technology, at the Global Women in Management (GWIM) Program Reception, a Women’s Economic Opportunity Initiative funded by ExxonMobil, Twelve Apostles Hotel, Cape Town
Mrs Pam Darwin, ExxonMobil Vice President Exploration Africa,
Mr Peter Claypool, General Manager, ExxonMobil Exploration & Production South Africa,
Ms Tessie San Martin, President and CEO, Plan International USA,
GWIM participants
Thank you very much for inviting me to join you this evening.
South Africa has been a democratic country for 21 years. In that period, despite many intractable challenges, it has made noteworthy progress. A regular feature of the new democratic order has been the objective evaluation of South Africa's progress every five years. This process has been supported by reports such as the recent Goldman Sachs report that noted the following about our first 20 years of freedom:
- GDP almost trebled from $136bn to $385bn today
- Inflation fell from a 1980-1994 average of 14% to an average of 6% from 1994-2012
- Gross gold and FX reserves rose from $3bn to $50bn today
- Tax receipts of R114bn from 1.7m people rose to R814bn from 13.7m people
In the past decade there has been a dramatic rise in the middle class, with 4.5m consumers graduating upwards from the lower (1-4) Living Standards Measure (LSM) and in total 10m consumers added to the middle-higher LSMs (5-10)
Social grant beneficiaries rose from 2.4m to 16.1m people today, meaning that state support to the vulnerable increased dramatically.
But freedom is about more than numbers. It's about restoring the dignity of the oppressed people of South Africa. It's about giving effect to the Freedom Charter's vision of a united, non-racial, non-sexist, free, democratic, peaceful, and prosperous South Africa.
After winning political power and the right to vote, our target was economic emancipation and the pursuit of redistributive policies that would give equality, both race and gender equality, it's real meaning. Freedom in political terms that excludes economic transformation is incomplete and a negation of true meaning of equality.
That is why women's development programmes, such as this one, are so important.
We have adopted the National Development Plan (NDP) as the framework to achieve a stronger economy that creates employment. At the core of the NDP is the focus on high priority sectors such as energy, infrastructure, ICT, mining, as well as the underlying emphasis on building our manufacturing capacity and skills development.
We are looking for radical economic transformation and that means that there is urgent need for dialogue between government and private sector to appreciate that the task of building the economy belongs to all. Creative ways are needed to promote entrepreneurship and a more inclusive economy.
It is a mark of remarkable progress that in the past 21 years more than 10 million people, mostly black, have been added to the middle class. This is a consequence of economic transformation and the widening of participation through making the economy more inclusive. The growth of the middle class in South Africa offers opportunities to industry and a chance to grow a stronger and more diverse economy.
We have also put in place a gender equality framework, in our constitution, in our law, and in our practices. Over the last 20 years there have been fundamental changes in occupational structure, in qualifications, and in skills required in different economic sectors. The overall pattern is for upskilling or an increase in “skill intensity”, especially in managerial, professional, and associate professional occupations.
Despite these new opportunities gender inequality continues to persist in our economy. This means societies and enterprises need to think differently about equity in economic inclusion. We should not rely simply on professions or established industry. We need innovative approaches to strengthening NGOs led by women, and to investing in women-led enterprises, to sustain promising initiatives and encourage them to grow.
Today, South Africa has achieved a level of gender equality that has only been accomplished in other countries after many decades of democracy.
For the first time we have many women in Parliament. For the first time, we have women leading universities. And for the first time we have women as business executives in South Africa.
But there is so much more to do. We have neither a woman-led bank nor a funding organisation dedicated to investing in female entrepreneurs. Tourism is a significant economic sector in South Africa. Yet there is no woman-owned and led hotel group.
I think it has something to do with the business culture prevalent among women, which tends to be individual-enterprise focussed rather than focussed on harnessing the potential muscle of women's economic power.
Women need to think in a different and radical fashion about the investment and enterprise opportunities available to them. They should be encouraged to think of collective community ownership and investment and find ways of them empowering women through collaborative enterprises focussed on creative sectors that are currently neglected - services, design, financial administration and property development.
Women should be encouraged to enter non traditional fields such as science and technology and to become established researchers in emerging disciplines.
Women have all the qualities necessary for leadership and management. Effective managers plan the goals of an organisation, recruit the necessary staff, organise them, and closely supervise them to make sure that the initial plan is executed properly. Successful leadership goes beyond management of plans and tasks. Successful leaders mobilise all possible means and human resources. Successful leaders inspire. We don’t need autocratic modes of leadership that favour men any longer. We need transformational modes of leadership in which leaders seek to change the unequal conditions of society. Mentorship has always been important to women. It still is. That is why women must be in all fields of economic and social action. We need to change the current situation in which women corporate leaders are an exception rather than the rule.
Female CEOs are still very rare, women are the minority in engineering and hard-science fields, and there is still a gender pay gap. Yet women make up more than half the workforce and women are better than men at earning degrees. Let’s make these two facts work for women.
In closing, the following facts should be encouraging for all women entrepreneurs.
Half of the world's self-made female billionaires live in China.
In 1870 in the US there were precisely three female lawyers, whereas there are now 300,000 –40% of the whole.
Scandinavian countries hold the record for gender segregation because they have gone the furthest in outsourcing traditional female activities and turning unpaid home-based caring into formal employment.
Finally, the value of an all inclusive leadership programme, such as this one, is immeasurable. I congratulate ExxonMobil for this initiative and wish all participants success in their chosen fields of endeavour.
I thank you.
