Skills transfer tops trade talks

THE transfer of technical skills is set to be the main focus in investment talks between Gauteng businesses and trade delegates from the Chinese city of Guangzhou, said Joan Fubbs, chairperson of the parliamentary portfolio committee on trade and industry has said.

Fubbs was speaking at the Africa Guangzhou Economic and Business week held at the Johannesburg Country Club on Wednesday.

She said that South Africa was hoping to move away from being an economy that imported fully made products to one that partnered with other countries to learn the skills to create goods domestically.

"We would like to see China bring the skills that South Africa needs to learn. For example, we don't want to buy completed cars, we want to do it ourselves," she said.

"The transfer of skills is a major plank in our policy and we know that China is one of the world's greatest educators. We are sending out more than we receive, with a resulting imbalance that may be corrected by the end of the fourth quarter but the figure is pretty good. The Chinese have agreed to the need for beneficiation, however."

Baloyi Mudunwazi, general manager for investment trade and projects at the Gauteng Economic Development Agency, said that there was a great need for Gauteng to link itself with other industrial sectors as the province that contributed the most to South Africa's GDP.

The Guangzhou delegation was in South Africa with representatives from the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade Committee and the China Chamber of Commerce. The representatives were given the opportunity to network with a wide range of business interests on possible projects.