NEVA MAKGETLA: Master plans could change save-the-big-firms-first policies
Smaller businesses, households and citizens would have to bear much less of the cost
Industrial policy aims to promote a more advanced and equitable economy, brimming with innovative and dynamic industries that create jobs and new business opportunities on a mass scale. But in practice economic policies over the past 20 years have often sought to save big established companies at the cost of other producers, households and the fiscus. The new “master plans” process will hopefully turn this around.
In steel, over the past decade ArcelorMittal SA has closed plants and cut production. It suffers from inflated iron ore prices from Kumba in Northern Cape, surging Chinese steel production that depressed global prices, Eskom’s soaring tariffs and unreliability, and a parent company that seems uninterested in maintaining production in SA. But ArcelorMittal also depends on huge old plants, some dating back to the 1920s, that are less agile and often more expensive and energy-intensive than modern minimills...
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