Kigali - Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies yesterday downplayed the significance of Egypt overtaking South Africa as the second-largest economy on the continent, saying growth in other African countries still presented opportunities for South Africa.
The International Monetary Fund’s World Economic Outlook last month said Egypt had bumped South Africa off its spot as Africa’s second-largest economy.
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South Africa is Africa’s most-industrialised economy and for a long time was the continent’s largest economy, but Nigeria overtook it after it rebased its economic indicators in 2014.
Speaking on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) on Africa in Kigali, Rwanda, Davies said: “The growth of other (African) economies presents opportunities for us.
“Nigeria is one of South Africa’s major trading partners. In 2014, bilateral trade between the two economic powerhouses was over R66 billion.”
Davies said that, with their relatively large populations, Nigeria (170 million) and Egypt (90 million), it came as no surprise their economies had the largest GDPs (gross domestic product) on the continent.
He said that with a population of about 55 million, South Africa was still ahead of Nigeria and Egypt, on GDP per capita basis. Meanwhile, Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa said proper co-ordination and transparency were critical for successful implementation of infrastructure projects in Africa.
Ramaphosa said: “At a social level, transparency enhances accountability. As you increase transparency, there is less room for corruption.”
Ramaphosa, who is leading the South African delegation to the WEF Africa, was one of the members of a panel discussing infrastructure investments.
He said South Africa made headway in infrastructure investment after it set up the presidential infrastructure co-ordinating committee to co-ordinate and accelerate implementation of projects.
“(The committee) has helped (Economic Development Minister Ebrahim) Patel to have sight of all the infrastructure projects.” Patel chairs the secretariat responsible for the committee’s day-to-day work.
“The co-ordination has paid dividends. If you co-ordinate at the top level, you are almost half way,” Ramaphosa said.
He said infrastructure planning also enhanced accountability and made for easy detection of corruption. “As you increase transparency, there is less room for corruption.”
He said successful implementation of major projects in South Africa helped to “crowd in” private sector players.
“We have embraced the idea of working with the private sector at close range.”
Ramaphosa highlighted South Africa’s procurement of renewable energy from private companies as part of a government-led procurement programme. “We are about to build our first coal-power station with the private sector.
“We say to international investors: come to South Africa; there is money to be made in developing our infrastructure,” the deputy president said.
Responding to a question about the adequacy of the continent’s tax systems, the deputy president said that Africa should be thankful to the AU for appointing former president Thabo Mbeki as chairman of the body’s panel of illicit financial flows.
“He has come up with a very good report. Africa is losing billions of rand. We need to close those loops.”
Ramaphosa added that Africa needed tighter financial regulations to deal with so-called tax havens.
“All the money should stay in the continent. “Even the national reserves should be in Africa so that we have all the money to develop the continent.”
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