Business Reporter
FOREIGN Affairs and International Trade Minister Dr Frederick Shava has implored the SADC member states, and the private sector to increase their efforts towards higher levels of industrialisation.
Addressing delegates on the fourth day of the SADC Industrialisation Week yesterday, Minister Shava noted that the SADC industrialisation agenda could only be realised through a combination of interventions that include value addition of resources abundant in the southern regional bloc and empowerment of small to medium enterprises.
He said relevant support and investment including human and financial capital should be channelled towards support and growth of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs).
The seventh SADC Industrialisation Week underway in Zimbabwe is part of deliberate efforts to incorporate MSMEs to showcase their products and services, a position that gives impetus to efforts to help them make inroads regionally.
This is coming at a time when entrepreneurship is in the spotlight globally.
Running under the theme "Promoting Innovation to Unlock Opportunities for Sustainable Economic Growth and Development Towards an Industrialised SADC", the SADC Industrialisation Week has been oversubscribed after attracting participants from local private, state-owned entities and exhibitors from across the region.
The week-long event has been hailed as a perfect platform to cross-pollinate initiatives that will spur regional economic development to new heights.
Thus far, the SADC Industrialisation Week has been a marketplace of ideas, insights,connections, and networks that advance the region's economic integration and industrialisation agenda.
"As we continue with this journey, we must always recognise that the private sector is a vital cog in both the development of infrastructure and industrialisation processes.
"It therefore implore member states, the SADC Secretariat, the private sector, and players to redouble efforts in ensuring that set targets are met as we work towards transforming the region into a highly industrialised community, leaving no country behind," said Minister Shava.
Minister Shava said an inclusive development that model nurtured SMEs needed to be crafted to ensure that the SADC region achieved more sustainable industrial-growth.
"To ensure that the SMEs thrive in the zero-sum economic landscape, where everyone is vying for the same market, there is need for us to invest in human and financial capital to support their growth.
"You will agree that the efforts we spare in creating an enabling environment for foreign direct investments should equally be spared in creating an enabling environment for domestic investors, big or small because the emergency of strong and competitive SMEs will accelerate industrialisation and spur economic growth," added the minister.
He noted that the regional countries were endowed with half of the world's vanadium, platinum, and diamonds, along with 36 percent of gold and 20 percent of cobalt which were being exported raw.
In that regard, he advocated for regional countries to digress from the old economic model of resource extraction to value addition given that beneficiation would create quality jobs and high returns from the export of finished products.
"Despite these huge mineral deposits, we have not fully transformed our economies because, after extraction, the minerals are highly exported in raw form due to the lack of technologies to benefit them.
"It is imperative that we shy away from the old economic model of resource extraction only and promote the development of value addition.
"It is critical to put science, technology and development, and innovation to the fore for all efforts at economic development if we are to optimally benefit from the abundant resources that our region is endowed with," said Minister Shava.
The SADC industrialisation agenda was introduced during the 34th SADC Summit of Heads of State and Government held in Victoria Falls in 2014.
This culminated in the development and adoption of the SADC industrialisation Strategy and Roadmap, which is aligned to Africa's economic blueprint, Agenda 2063.
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Since then, successive SADC summits and summit themes have continued to carry a common message that emphasises the need for the region to industrialise and transform into a competitive community for improved lives and livelihoods of SADC citizens.
The region has been implementing the industrialisation strategy and roadmap, beginning with the first phase which ran from 2015 to 2020.
The second phase,which is aligned with the SADC's vision, 2050, is running from 2021 to 2050.
The SADC Industrialisation week is an annual public-private engagement platform designed to foster new opportunities for intra-African trade, develop cross-border value chains, and identify investment opportunities in the SADC region.
It will precede the Senior Officials, Council of Ministers meetings, and SADC Summit, which will take place from August 9-18, 2024 at the New Parliament Building.
Traditionally, SIW is organised by the SADC Summit host Government, through the Ministry responsible for Industry, the SADC Business Council, and the SADC Secretariat.
