How to get SA going: deindustrialisation
The economy must reverse decades of deindustrialisation if it is to tackle the country’s urgent challenges
Over the past two decades, the structure of the SA economy has shifted in the wrong direction — towards producing less diverse, lower-value-added products. This has contributed to stubbornly low growth rates and persistently high unemployment across the country. Only a change in behaviour from government and business — with everyone committing to a structural transformation aimed at developing SA’s industrial capabilities — will generate higher incomes and wealth on a sustainable basis. This is the main message of a report by the University of Johannesburg’s new Industrial Development Think Tank under professor Simon Roberts on how to reverse decades of deindustrialisation in SA. The report, "Structural Transformation in SA: Moving Towards a Smart, Open Economy for All", points out that between 1994 and 2016 the manufacturing industry’s value-added contribution grew by an annual average of just 1.6% compared with 5.5% among all upper-middle income countries. Unsurprisingly, the comp...
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