Mission to Mozambique a Success – Deputy Minister Gina |
| The Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry, Ms Nomalungelo Gina says her three-day visit to Mozambique will contribute significantly in strengthening bilateral economic relations between South Africa and Mozambique. Gina arrived in Mozambique on Wednesday, 27 November 2019 and returns to South Africa today. She was leading the Maputo leg of the Outward Trade and Investment Mission to Mozambique organised by the Department of trade and Industry (the dti). A delegation comprising of about 50 business and government representatives participated in the mission, which started in the Mozambican northern town of Pemba on Sunday.
“As a department we are happy that we have achieved the objective of the mission, which was to expose our companies to the plethora of opportunities for trade and investment that are available for exploring in the Mozambican economy. Our businesspeople were awed by the incredible amount of information that was shared with them on the mega gas projects during the two business seminars that were held in Pemba and Maputo. As the South African government we also used the opportunity to emphasise to our businesspeople the need for them to look beyond the oil and gas projects as these will have a massive positive impact on various other sectors of the Mozambican economy which continues to grow and is set to be transformed massively by the gas projects,” says Gina. She identified agro-processing, agriculture, infrastructure, housing, retail, manufacturing and sea, rail and road transport as some of the sectors where trade and investment opportunities will mushroom as a results of the gas projects. Gina also held a bilateral meeting with the Mozambican Minister of Trade and Commerce, Mr Ragendra Berta de Sousa. The two discussed a variety of issues pertaining to promoting trade and investment between South Africa and Mozambique as part of the implementation of the Memorandum of Understanding that was signed in Cape Town in February this year. After the meeting they announced that they agreed to establish a technical team consisting of officials from the dti and the Mozambican Department of Trade and Commerce. The team will be responsible for recommending solutions for the various challenges that companies from both countries experience in doing business in either country. “In our bilateral meeting we emphasised the need for our governments to provide a conducive environment to make it easy for the private sector to contribute in increasing trade and investment between the two countries. The team will look at all the hurdles and bottlenecks that impact negatively on the ease of doing business so that they may receive attention and be resolved at the highest political level in order to ensure the smooth and successful implementation of the MoU,’’ says Gina. She also visited the Beluluane Industrial Park and one of the South African companies operating in the park. “We had fruitful discussions with the management of the industrial park. Amongst others, we identified the need for the park to establish linkages with our special economic zones and see if they cannot work together in attracting investors. I was impressed by the fact that there are already thirteen South African companies that have set up operations in the park. This is in line with our strategy as government to encourage investments by the South African companies in the continent,” adds Gina. Gina also met with the management of one of the South African companies located in the park, Capital Star Steel that is involved in multi-billion dollar projects in Mozambique, as well as the management of the country’s investment and export promotion agency (APIEX).
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