{"id":443,"date":"2012-04-16T13:43:49","date_gmt":"2012-04-16T13:43:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/?p=443"},"modified":"2012-04-16T13:43:49","modified_gmt":"2012-04-16T13:43:49","slug":"sa-economy-improving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/news\/sa-economy-improving","title":{"rendered":"SA economy improving"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"The<\/a>

The Eurozone<\/p><\/div>\n

Johannesburg – South Africa\u2019s economy is improving but is vulnerable to problems in the Eurozone, says Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan.<\/p>\n

\u201cEconomic growth is reasonably stable,\u201d Gordhan said at the Foreign Correspondents Association breakfast meeting in Johannesburg on Monday.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike many other parts of the world, the economy is still subject to the vagaries of the global economy, in particular the European situation. From our point of view, we look forward to a far more clear set of actions coming from European countries that will give markets the certainty they require.\u201d<\/p>\n

Uncertainty, he said, damaged growth as well as employment prospects.<\/p>\n

The minister\u2019s comments come ahead of the G20 meeting convening on Thursday and Friday, which is expected to address the European crisis where leaders will find out if they are any closer to a definitive answer on the matter.<\/p>\n

It is also expected to look into whether the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has adequate resources and if it requires additional funds.<\/p>\n

Globally, the world is moving towards multi-polarity where traditional methods of growth are not operational. \u201cWe are living in epoch-changing shifts in the economy, they don\u2019t happen overnight nor can they be judged over a short period. These are shifts that are reflected in the way in which global growth is being distributed,\u201d said Gordhan.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are now in a multi-polar world of transition. Multi-polarity is where we are heading. It shouldn\u2019t be seen as this enforced historical change that we have to live with but rather as a vital necessity to ensure that global growth is restored .\u201d<\/p>\n

On the decision by rating agencies to place South Africa on a negative watch, Gordhan said comments made by the agencies were \u201cunfortunate\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of the concerns by agencies seem to be an unfortunate casting of European shadows on the South African scene and there is nothing to suggest in the numbers or policy pronouncement that this government has made to justify the kind of doubts that rating agencies are placing on South Africa.\u201d<\/p>\n

There were, however, social demands to better deliver resources. Gordhan said this was not driven by demands for more money to be spent but rather for money to be better spent and less subject to corruption, a matter which government was attending to.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to build up a 10-year fiscal framework, which will tell us what we can afford and how we need to grow the economy to overcome challenges,\u201d said the minister.<\/p>\n

South Africa is working to improve growth with its infrastructure programme that was recently announced, as well as with the competitive programme for the industrial sector, support for emerging farmers, investment in science and technology\u00a0 as well as employment expansion – particularly for the youth, for whom processes in this regard [for youth employment] were \u201ctaking too long\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are immense opportunities on the continent,\u201d said Gordhan.<\/p>\n

On the issue of reducing unemployment, Gordhan said this ambition depended on the extent of economic growth, labour absorption as well as greater investment in industries that have a larger capability to employ people, among others.<\/p>\n

\u201cI admit [we are] not easily going to meet some of the targets we set but I\u2019m hopeful that some of the programmes we put in place might begin to change the picture. If we can get the global economy to settle down and get back to a growth path, we might see a different picture in about five years.\u201d<\/p>\n

South Africa aims to create five million jobs by 2020. Gordhan said more needed to be done, adding that 70 percent of the job creation target must come from the private sector.<\/p>\n

The minister stressed that incentives for business to create jobs were available, and that far more \u201curgent discussion\u201d was needed in this regard. – BuaNews<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Johannesburg – South Africa\u2019s economy is improving but is vulnerable to problems in the Eurozone, says Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":444,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[182,27,1],"tags":[16,343,15],"class_list":["post-443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-europe","category-featured","category-news","tag-economy","tag-eurozone","tag-south-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=443"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":445,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443\/revisions\/445"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebizsense.com\/za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}