The Tourism, Trade and Investment promotion agency for the Western Cape, WESGRO, has locked down over R4 billion of new direct investment into the provincial economy. Over the next five years, these investments are expected to create over 1500 jobs in various sectors.
Despite a global economic downturn and the energy crisis in South Africa, the organisation says the province continues to attract serious business.
WESGRO is tasked with, among others, generating investment into the Western Cape economy. Working closely with all its public and private stakeholders, it aided in securing economic injections for growth from countries such as Norway, Germany and the United States.
More than 50 % of these investments are in the green economy and around 17% in the pharmaceutical industry. Over the next five years, projects such as the manufacturing of solar equipment and cold storage for the health sector will take place.
“We have seen 50% of our investment over the last 10 years coming to future industries so it is the green economy, the tech industry and we so apart from all of those, we have strong energy eco system, strong green eco system put apart from that. Very importantly all of the fundamentals are in place. So, we have a strategy which is called growth for jobs strategy which is designed, it’s an all of province attempt on growing the economy,” says WESGRO CEO Wrenelle Stander.
No investments will be done without the security of energy.
But, WESGRO says with over R1 billion allocated to the securing of energy by the Western Cape government and municipalities like the City of Cape Town working to rid itself of load shedding in the next 18 months, investors are on board.
“We are able to share with them the plans so we are going through a dark patch so to say but certainly what we are seeing is that as Eskom generation numbers decline, private sector generation is increasing. So, I think that there is a good story to tell so it’s not all doom and gloom,” Stander elaborates.
The Western Cape is a major economic contributor to the GDP of the country. During the 4th quarter of the previous financial year, the majority of jobs created in the country came from the province.
WESGRO says work is done around the clock to continue securing more investments.
“We are going to be working very hard on attracting investment into the energy sector and that would include obviously generation but also investment into expanding the grid, water infrastructure, we have a burgeoning space eco system developing between Stellenbosch and Somerset West. We’re going to be doing a whole lot of more work in that space, health, agriculture, so there’s a lot of work in the pipeline but I do have to say that the green economy and the future sectors are definitely a place to watch,” Stander explains.
