Chair, may I please ask that you do not remind me when there are two minutes remaining, because I am not going to tell a story. I am going to debate the politics of industrial expansion. [Interjections.]
Hon Minister, the Freedom Charter says that the mineral wealth beneath the soil, the banks and the monopoly industries shall be transferred to the ownership of the people as a whole. The sentence immediately after that states that all other industry and trade shall be controlled for the wellbeing of all people. [Interjections.] That is what the Freedom Charter says. Those who admit that the Freedom Charter is a programme, not of the ANC, but of everyone, understand that it means that the nationalisation of mines, banks and monopoly industries should happen, whilst all other trade and industry is controlled for the wellbeing of the people. That is the basis upon which we, as the EFF, debate industrial and trade policy, which is one of our cardinal pillars.
There are two decisions that were taken by the Portfolio Committee on Trade and Industry. One was the commitment that we are going to pass legislation that will compel government to procure 75% of its goods and services locally. If that is indeed the case and it is true, and if it happens and government indeed purchases 75% of goods and services locally, it looks like it is going to lead somewhere. We agree with that. It should include the food that the government buys for school feeding schemes, hospitals, prisons, and such areas. It must include electronics. It must include textiles. It must include all purchases for government activities. However, that must be coupled with building local capacity to manufacture and produce these goods and services.
With regard to food, there is low agricultural productivity in South Africa. Why? It is because we do not have access to land. [Applause.] If we continue at the current pace of land redistribution, it means we are going to take more than 100 years just to redistribute 50% of the land in South Africa. That deprives South Africa of the space to produce food locally. These are some of the things that we must deal with at a policy and ideological level.
The second issue we agreed upon in the Portfolio Committee on Trade and Industry was that a certain component of the mineral resources produced in South Africa should be locally beneficiated and industrialised. The ANC says 20%; the EFF says 50% of these minerals must be locally beneficiated and industrialised. [Interjections.] You can't do that now, because you do not have access to mineral resources.
Minister, none of the platinum from Platinum Group Metals is for sale in South Africa. We are saying that, while we know the ANC won't nationalise the mines now, at least use the state-owned mining company to extract minerals in order to locally beneficiate and industrialise them. That is the only thing you can do. You have a policy instrument and the space to deal with those issues.
The multinational corporations that are in mining will not work with you to beneficiate platinum and all these other mineral resources. Why not? It is because they are involved in practices and occurrences of transfer pricing and base erosion, and all these issues we have been speaking about.
I am happy that the chairperson of the portfolio committee has now admitted that there is no proper alignment and co-ordination of industrial policy intra- and intergovernmentally. That is the reality. Earlier on, the Department of Economic Development denied that this was the case. However, it is the case that there is no proper co-ordination of industrial policy in respect of what provinces and local municipalities do and what national government and various departments do. That is your primary responsibility. You know about the Ministry of International Trade and Industry in Japan that successfully industrialised Japan post-World War II. If you could design a model like that, then we can talk about the industrial success of South Africa. [Interjections.]
The other issue which is very important is to keep a close eye on your development finance institutions. If you don't give them proper guidance, they will do what the National Empowerment Fund, NEF, did - take money that is supposed to be financing sustainable industrial development and give it to friends who are opening up boutiques and selling luxury goods and services with access for a few individuals only. [Interjections.]
Those are the basic, logical things that you have to deal with. You don't have to agree with the EFF with regard to our radical economic policy position. [Interjections.] You can work with your current policy instruments and institutions to realise successful industrial expansion, as anticipated. Thank you very much, Chair. [Applause.]