Chairperson, hon Minister, hon Deputy Minister and hon Members of Parliament, I am rising to announce that the ANC supports Budget Vote No 35 - Trade and Industry.
The ANC says in its statement of 8 January 2010:
We have placed the creation of decent work at the centre of our efforts to address poverty ... and inequality, and government policies and programmes are meant to speak to this goal ...
The level of unemployment, poverty and inequality remains very high, with South Africa's official jobless rate being among the highest in the world at 24,3%. However, using the expanded definition, the unemployment rate is at 34,4%.
Unless the structure of our economy, which is characterised by massive unemployment, is transformed fundamentally, the government will not be able to address the challenge of creating decent work and sustainable livelihoods.
In the state of the nation address, His Excellency, President Jacob Zuma, alerted the nation to the fact that South Africa has a youthful population with nearly 70% of the people being under the age of 35. Collaborating this fact, the analysis of unemployment shows that the unemployed youth between 15 and 35 years of age account for 73% of those who lost their jobs during the recent recession. This means that well over three million employable young people, mainly African and women, are unemployed.
Even more disturbing are the latest statistics, which show that decent work has contracted by 12,7%, whilst temporary, part-time, contract and other forms of casual employment have increased by 23,7%. This caused the number of casual workers in South Africa to increase from 1,5 million in 2000 to about 3,9 million of the total number of employed persons in March 2010.
Our democratic, developmental state must play a central and strategic role in creating decent work for our youth, and in this regard, pay special attention to women and persons with disability.
Through Ipap 2 and the trade policy, the developmental state will focus on improving growth in key manufacturing sectors with the main thrust being to create decent work and provide sustainable livelihoods to millions of our people.
Ipap 2 identifies three cluster sectors with the potential to create decent work. The first cluster of sectors includes metal fabrication, capital and transport equipment, green industries, energy-saving industries and agriprocessing.
The second cluster consists of automotives and components, medium and heavy vehicles, plastics, pharmaceuticals and chemicals, clothing, textiles, footwear and leather, biofuels, forestry, paper, pulp and furniture, tourism and cultural industries, and business process services.
Cluster 3 is made up of advanced capabilities such as nuclear energy, aerospace and advanced materials.
This calls for intensified investment in the productive and labour- intensive sectors of the economy. Furthermore, we must redouble our efforts to establish co-operatives and SMMEs in order to bring the majority of our people into the mainstream of economic activity and maximise government's capacity to create decent work.
Also, Ipap 2 makes it possible for the government to invest in knowledge- based industries. Therefore, the key to economic growth, decent work and sustainable livelihoods lies in enhancing the skills capacity of all citizens so that they can make a productive contribution to the economy, instead of being excluded by unemployment, poverty and inequality. Lack of technical skills will jeopardise the implementation of Ipap 2.
Rural development and agrarian reform must address the question of redistribution and ownership of productive land to rural communities to create decent work and ensure food security.
Research shows that 2,5 million households are involved in the production of their own food, and three-quarters of this number are found in KwaZulu- Natal, the Eastern Cape and Limpopo. We must increase this number, Chairperson. Therefore, the budgetary processes of government must speak to the funding of the implementation programmes of Ipap 2.
Sihlalo, amabhange okuxhasa osomabhizinisi kanye nazo zonke izikhungo zikahulumeni zokuxhasa osomabhizinisi nabalimi abasafufusa, kufanele zabelwe imali eyanele ukuze zixhase, ziqeqeshe futhi zinakekele osomabhizinisi abasafufusa, ukuze baphumelele futhi babe negalelo elibonakalayo ekwakhiweni kwemisebenzi eminingi encomekayo.
Kodwa kufanele ukuthi siqaphele ukuthi, laba osomabhizinisi nabalimi bangafufusi noma bakhase kuze kuyoshona ilanga. Kufanele sibasize bathuthuke baze babe yizinkampani ezinkulu ezizokwazi ukuthi ngelinye ilanga zifike ezingeni lokuthi zikwazi ukuhweba namazwe angaphandle. (Translation of isiZulu paragraphs follows.)
[Chairperson, the banks and government institutions which fund businesspeople and emerging farmers, should be given enough money in order to fund, train and look after the up and coming business people, so that they succeed and make a meaningful contribution to creating more jobs.
However, it is necessary for us to be careful so that these business people and farmers should not be emerging or crawling forever. We must help them to grow until they become big companies that will some day reach the stage of trading globally.]
Furthermore, Ipap 2 enables the developmental state to invest in green and renewable energy industries with a potential to create hundreds of decent job opportunities. For instance, it has been suggested that the bioenergy sector has the potential to create between 600 000 and one million jobs. But as we seek to create these jobs in this particular sector, we must balance decent work creation and food security.
Failure of government and the private sector to fund its implementation will relegate Ipap 2 and the trade policy to being useless papers in state cupboards, and we shall have failed to bring about socioeconomic equity in our country.
During the extended public hearings, all those who made presentations to the Portfolio Committee on Trade and Industry, including the private sector, expressed full support for Ipap 2.
If the project of creating a massive number of decent jobs and sustainable livelihoods is to succeed, big business must commit itself to diverting profits from investing in the international financial markets to reinvesting in the productive sectors of the South African economy.
Dr Miriam Altman, the Director of the Centre for Poverty, Employment and Growth at the Human Sciences Research Council says that, looking into the future, the private sector will have to pick up speed and devote meaningful attention to building industries which are globally competitive, with strong employment linkages in the domestic economy.
The government must, therefore, call business, labour and civil society to rolling mass action for the creation of decent work and sustainable livelihoods. Thank you, Chairperson. [Applause.]