Hon Speaker, members of the NA, Minister Davies and Minister Lindiwe Zulu, Deputy Minister Thabethe and other Deputy Ministers who are here, other Ministers, heads of department, the Acting Secretary-General of the ANC Youth League, Comrade Magasela, the Speaker of the Council of Ekurhuleni, other officials of government who are here, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, I am humbled to be part of the fifth administration led by President Zuma. Even more so, as the ruling party, we have received an overwhelming mandate from our people to push for radical economic policies in which our department, the Department of Trade and Industry, DTI, is going to play an important role.
When President Zuma called for radical socioeconomic transformation, he called on all South Africans to build an inclusive economy anchored in a large and growing industrial sector underpinned by broad-based black economic empowerment, BBBEE.
In the coming financial year, the DTI will continue to improve its implementation of the Industrial Policy Action Plan, Ipap, as well as the Minerals Beneficiation Action Plan, MBAP. We will also move decisively to develop bolder and sharper instruments to support black industrialists and youth entrepreneurs. But, more importantly, we will ensure that they are sustainable and viable.
The groundwork required to fulfil these imperatives has been done in terms of policy frameworks. These include the black economic empowerment, BEE, legislation that has been put in place as well as the National Industrial Policy Framework, NIPF, and Ipap.
The Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment Act and its codes were amended last year to close a number of loopholes that were identified dealing specifically with issues in respect of companies that were engaged on matters of fronting and also to ensure that we better align the BEE imperatives with the need to promote industrialisation of the South African economy.
Over the past 20 years of freedom, we have also been able to analyse the extent to which the BEE has been able to achieve the required results, from the number of black people who have been able to participate in either shareholding, with little board influence and strategic oversight, to the extent to which black people have direct executive responsibility for major enterprises in manufacturing, agriculture, mining and other services.
There is therefore a need to intensify black participation in the productive sector, especially in sectors prioritised in Ipap, such as plastics and chemicals, automotives, agro-processing, metal fabrication and downstream mineral beneficiation, to name but a few.
To facilitate a more meaningful participation of black people in the mainstream economy, we will look at various ways to develop black sustainable industrialists. I will be leading a team that will be working closely with the Presidential Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment Advisory Council to develop special action in this regard.
One such action will be the creation of a targeted incentive to support black entrepreneurs entering the industrial sector, including the film sector, as well as focusing more on talent support, which is often ignored. The government's Infrastructure Build Programme, as well as government's procurement of goods and services for its normal operations, provides a crucial opportunity for deepening and transforming the industrial base in South Africa.
Assisting local enterprises to provide these goods and services will create jobs in South Africa, develop skills and create a springboard for these enterprises to progressively develop their capacity and eventually enter the export market. Doing so is not just patriotic from our side, but also, more importantly, is an economic and financial necessity that we as the DTI will have to do. We will be working towards meeting the target of 75%, as set by the ruling party, of government procurement of goods and services produced by local manufacturers throughout the country.
However, the government cannot drive the industrialisation agenda alone. There is also a clear need for partnerships with the private sector and broader society if we are to be able to drive this agenda successfully. The focus over the medium term will be on engagement with industry through an initiative called "Taking the DTI to the factories", amongst others, so that we get to exchange the programmes of government that we lead.
We believe that to create new opportunities for the private sector to engage with the DTI, and for the DTI to provide information on the kinds of support that is available to them, will enable us to take our economy forward.
Given the challenges of unemployment in the country, we are calling on the private sector to utilise state instruments to fully participate in the One Company, One Job initiative, the campaign that will be driven by my office, working together with business, labour and civil society so that we can deal with issues of unemployment. [Applause.]
We will further monitor government expenditure linked to the ruling party's commitment to job creation, including imposing some requirements on companies doing business with the state at all levels. We will also focus on companies that are accessing some of the incentives of the state, like companies that approach the state requiring licensing as well as those that are doing imports and exports, so that we are able to engage the broader economy. [Interjections.]
Minister David has correctly articulated that we are now more determined to implement a high-impact industrial policy that would respond to the imminent threat of de-industrialisation and will lay the basis for the creation of a stronger industrial base. Equally, when the Minister was speaking here, he correctly reminded all of us about designated goods and services that are to be procured to meet the said percentage.
Indeed, we should welcome the next designation of strategic products to be added to the R1 trillion in goods and services that our government spends per annum so that those products can be procured from our people, as proposed.
The youth forms a large part of our population and it is a segment that is mostly affected by unemployment, at the rate of 36,1% according to the statistics of the first quarter of 2014.
As the DTI, we are going to launch a number of initiatives to address issues of youth unemployment. Due to the time factor, I am not going to elaborate further on those issues.
The process of developing financing mechanisms to ensure that small businesses as well as young people access start-up finance is at an advanced stage. We will work together with other financial institutions to ensure that young entrepreneurs are able to access these benefits from government.
Furthermore, a range of financial reforms are on the cards to ensure that inclusive growth is realised as well as access and participation by the majority of our people who have not been able to have access. It is not going to be "business as usual" if we are to achieve the radical economic programme. We must just state at this point that we are not going to be reckless or adventurous, but we are going to be much more radical, bold and decisive in proposing some of the reforms. [Interjections.]
Women's empowerment is still central to our plans as the DTI. We recognise that women play a critical role in South Africa's economy. As such, we have a number of programmes that we are going to implement, which our colleagues in the small, medium and micro enterprises, SMMEs, are going to be alluding to so that we can share some of the experiences. Over the years, the DTI has developed mechanisms to ensure that we integrate women into the mainstream economy. [Interjections.]
With regard to the current review of the National Export Strategy, NES, we aim to prioritise markets around Africa as a continent as well as in the Brics countries, because we think that those markets are fast developing. [Interjections.] [Laughter.] We must just state that some of the key initiatives that we are going to be looking at concern issues relating to the antipiracy programme that we are going to be rolling out. More importantly, we are also going to focus more on film and television, which have continued to play a major role in the country. There are a number of other proposals that we have here, including looking at the issue of needle time in the music industry.
We want to call on our colleagues to work together with us to ensure that we bring integrity to the work that we as a department do. However, the opposition must assist us where we are not making inroads so that we are able to grow the economy of South Africa. [Interjections.]
The President has made a call for radical socioeconomic transformation. All of us will have to work towards that. Thank you very much. [Time expired.] [Applause.]