IDC APPROVES R746 MILLION IN COVID RELIEF MEASURES

THE INDUSTRIAL Development Corporation (IDC) yesterday announced the approval of R746 million in relief measures for a number of businesses as part of the government’s Covid-19 economic interventions. The IDC said R440.8m of the money had already been disbursed under three of its interventions: essential supplies, the distressed and the small industrial finance distressed funds. It said the essential supplies fund had been structured to provide funding to companies that manufacture or would import essential products on an urgent basis to combat the Covid-19 pandemic. It said the fund had already approved R536m to 15 companies producing sanitisers, disinfectants, tissue products, rapid test kits, surgical masks, and packaging for medical products among others. The IDC said the distress fund had also approved R160m to four clients in the textiles, aerospace and machinery and equipment industries, while R180m of transactions were in the pipeline. IDC chief executive Tshokolo Nchoncho said the corporation would be expediting the disbursement of these funds to qualifying clients after many applications were unsuccessful. “We have observed a rising increase in the number of distressed companies in need of support and in response we have now expanded our qualifying criteria with regard to the distressed fund,” Nchoncho said. “Our specific interventions are informed by our mandate to play a countercyclical role in times of a crisis such as this one, as well as our understanding of the impact of the pandemic to the economy, our clients and the IDC itself.” Nchoncho said IDC staff contributed R282 000 towards the solidarity fund. He said the IDC had ramped up its capital injection into the economy from to R10.8 billion at the height of the global economic meltdown in 2009 from R8.5bn in the preceding year, with R6.1bn going towards assisting distressed companies.