SA and China are “joined at the hip” and should work together to create value chains that are mutually beneficial, President Cyril Ramaphosa says.
Assuring stakeholders that the country was open for business, Ramaphosa vowed to deal with crime and easing of visa regulations, highlighting that the deep reforms SA has in the pipeline would make it more welcoming to foreign business.
The issues of crime and visa backlogs have often been cited by foreigners as some of the key impediments to foreign investment flowing into SA.
“We are advantageously placed for companies looking to expand into the rest of the continent,” the president, who is in China on a state visit and to attend the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, an official forum between the Asian country and almost all states in Africa.
The president was addressing the SA-China business forum in Beijing where he was courting financiers to invest in SA as it looked to shift from being an importer of manufactured goods to being a major exporter.
China is SA’s largest trading partner and bilateral agreements with the Asian giant have increased by a third since 2019. Chinese companies have pledged more than R18bn to Ramaphosa’s investment drive since 2018 into the manufacturing, resources, finance and agro-processing sectors.
The president — who was flanked by a business delegation that included leaders such as Standard Bank CEO Sim Tshabalala, Eskom chief Dan Marokane and African Women Chartered Accountants chair Sindisiwe Mabaso-Koyana — said SA was looking to China for environmentally friendly energy solutions.
Nobody is going to do us any favours, we need to negotiate the best terms for ourselves.
— Standard Bank CEO Sim Tshabalala
“We are on a path to revolutionise our energy sector in pursuit of low carbon, climate resilient development. We are actively seeking investment in the energy sector with a particular focus on renewables and green energy,” Ramaphosa said.
Additionally, SA was also on a path to modernise its infrastructure by investing in the expansion of ports, rail and road networks. Ramaphosa emphasised that the government was seeking to shift the structure of the two countries’ trade profile and deepen their investment relationship.
Meanwhile, Tshabalala said partnerships with international funders were crucial to catapult Africa into sustainable growth.
“If you think about it from a continental point of view, the continent requires roughly $3.4-trillion in infrastructure, there is not enough money on the continent to finance all of those projects,” Tshabalala told Business Day.
“The New Development Bank, the DBSA, the Africa Development Bank they just don’t have the balance sheet capability to finance these projects,” he said.
“We therefore need partners as Africans whether it be the World Bank, the MDB (multilateral development banks), our own development banks, Chinese financial institutions, American financial institutions, EU financial institutions. We need to mobilise those resources to implement our projects on the continent.”
Tshabalala said SA required the capacity, resources, engineering and construction capability and the funding from such partners to deliver crucial infrastructure projects so that the country can deliver services to its people.
The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China owns 20% of Standard Bank.
“Nobody is going to do us any favours, we need to negotiate the best terms for ourselves. Chinese people are great negotiators, if you don’t negotiate they will take the bargain, if you negotiate they will agree on the bargain,” the Standard Bank CEO said.
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