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Thabo Mbeki

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South African Politician

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“You cannot just depend on the market, because the market will say: China needs oil; China needs coal; China needs whatever, and Africa has got all these things in abundance. And we go there and get them, and the more we develop the Chinese economy, the larger the manufacturing is, the more we need global markets - sell it to the Africans which indeed might very well destroy whatever infant industries are trying to develop on the continent. That is what the market would do.”

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“There is a section of our population in South Africa that you can't expect to get integrated in the economy of its own. These are people without skills and that will include young people who might very well have matric certificates, but don't have the skills to be absorbed in the economy. So we need to target people like those in a special way, in a focused way so that they have the skills and the capacity to participate in the economy. That requires special programmes.”

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“I think anybody who knows anything about South Africa and the South African economy would know that one of the big constraints to growth and development is skills shortages. So all of us, need to come at this thing as vigorously as is possible and, of course, the private sector has the capacity to take it on board.”

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“If you look for instance at the automobile industry, part of the reason that you have the expansion of that sector, is precisely because we have gone out to talk to the automobile companies to explain government policy with regard to that sector, to talk to them about the MIDP and things like that. And indeed, it has been a very important part of attracting those investors to put in money in the South African economy and build motorcars in South Africa.”

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“We raised the matter of an agreement that was reached at the Growth and Development Summit, which was that we should access a certain part, 5% was mentioned, of the funds in the hands of the institutional investors, domestically, for investment in the real economy. That being an agreement of the Growth and Development Summit, we will engage South African business to see how we can make that a practical thing. So, there is a different set of engagement with local business.”

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“The point we are making is that the general global messages have been communicated, about the politics of South Africa, about the economy in general, all of these general questions. The rest of the world understands these things and are saying, let's now come to the specific things so that even we, as big corporate chiefs from around the world, can assist in these areas, which you have decided are your priority areas.”

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“When I was in government, the South African economy was growing at 4.5% - 5%. But then came the global financial crisis of 2008/2009, and so the global economy shrunk. That hit South Africa very hard, because then the export markets shrunk, and that includes China, which has become one of the main trade partners with South Africa. Also, the slowdown in the Chinese economy affected South Africa. The result was that during that whole period, South Africa lost something like a million jobs because of external factors.”

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