Making the president’s dream a reality, from the ground up
At local level we must think beyond new taxi ranks and market stalls
● “I dream of a SA where the first entirely new city built in the democratic era rises, with skyscrapers, schools, universities, hospitals and factories.” So said President Cyril Ramaphosa in his state of the nation address.
With 36-million South Africans (65% of the total population) cramped in urban areas that comprise 2% of the country’s 121-million-hectare land mass, the president is right to dream about new cities.
For this dream to become reality, however, the government will have to be awakened to the fact that building a city is not only about finding space and putting up skyscrapers. It is about creating and sustaining the economic opportunities that result in the necessity for skyscrapers and other elements of a city.
Johannesburg, for example, was built on the back of the mining industry. A city built outside an economic driver that attracts people to the area is bound to become a white elephant. Angola and Botswana are instructive in this regard.
Given this reality, the conversation about building new cities should be a conversation about the creation of new frontiers of the economic value chain. Of course, building new economic frontiers is easier said than done, and this is where the government has to dig much deeper and come up with evidence-based solutions that are implementable.
When developing new economic value chains, the government will have to identify sunrise industries, especially in the context of the fourth industrial revolution. It must also identify sunset industries that can be resuscitated or orientated into a different path of growth.
These industries must be chosen based on our strengths and weaknesses as a country, and factors such as local and global market trends.
The government can leverage the country’s research and development capabilities by creating an environment for product development and commercialisation of existing and new intellectual property. As it stands, SA’s nine science councils, among them the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, hold a number of innovations, potential patents and intellectual properties that are ripe for commercialisation.
Also, from a research and product development point of view, indigenous knowledge has untapped potential that could provide scope for new and globally competitive products. The country needs these products to create new industries and materials to grow the economy — and spawn the building of not just one new city.
Development funding institutions (DFI) will have to be repurposed to focus on supporting the development of new industries with a clear transformation agenda. The government will have to find ways to de-risk some of the outlays DFIs will have to make to support these new industries or new entrants to existing industries. The black industrialisation programme model is a step in the right direction in this regard, but such programmes must become a norm.
In fact, this task must not only be left to DFIs; private funding institutions must take up the mantle and provide funding alongside the DFIs, especially for those initiatives that hold greater promise of growth. Funders must work towards scaling up their funding initiatives and align them to the greater purpose of growing our economy.
There is also a conversation that must be had regarding the structuring of the beneficiaries of the many catalytic economic initiatives, from a transformation point of view. Structures such as co-operatives, employee share schemes and other broad-based empowerment schemes will have to be given preference without negating opportunities for an individual entrepreneur who adds genuine value to an initiative.
If the vision is premised on the fact that we are a hopeless society of thoughtless individuals who must be spoon-fed into prosperity by all-knowing local and international experts, then the point of the initiative would have been completely lost.
Also, key to living the president’s dream is a well-functioning local government. Only local governments can conceive, plan, zone, build, service and maintain cities. It is only local government that can provide the necessary infrastructure for industries to develop and thrive. It is therefore necessary that the new economic value chains are cascaded down to municipalities and provided for in their economic development strategies. Gone should be the days when these strategies are only about taxi ranks and market stalls. We need more imaginative and sustainable initiatives that are linked to regional and national economic development plans.
The unimpressive outcomes of the recent municipal audit points to a local government that has been neglected and largely treated as an appendage of government. Unfortunately for the president, among the hurdles he has to cross to realise his dream is fixing and capacitating municipalities. This may include redefining some aspects of the model for local government.
It is possible for a country to lift itself by its bootstraps and leapfrog beyond the traps of poverty, hunger and unemployment. Countries such as Singapore are a living example of how a poor country can, in one generation, rise from poverty to being wealthy and influential. Singapore was once a colony of the British Empire, and had no industry except its participation in entrepôt trade. Now one of the world’s fastestgrowing economies, Singapore was saved by its vision of industrialisation and globalisation of the sunrise industries while maintaining the sunset activities as a backbone of the economy.
SA, too, can leverage its collective intellect, its highly sophisticated financial system, developed transport and energy infrastructure, skilled human resources, unique geographical location and climate and relatively favourable standing among nations to achieve the same.
Above all, we can emulate Singapore’s example by joining the president in his dream.
Mabunda is group chief adviser: industrialisation at Ntiyiso Consulting