Cabinet has assured South Africans that government is committed to improving the country's economic performance.
“Despite acknowledging the debilitating effects of load shedding, Cabinet remains resolute in fixing the fundamentals, pursue critical areas of growth and drive collaborative solutions with all social partners so that together we set the country on a path to economic growth,” said Minister in the Presidency, Jackson Mthembu.
Addressing a media briefing on Thursday on the outcomes of the recent Cabinet meeting, the Minister said government is intensifying its investment drive.
“To date, projects with an investment value of R9 billion have been completed and 27 projects worth just over R250 billion are in implementation phases, with more coming on stream this year,” Mthembu said.
Government’s assurance follows Statistics South Africa’s report on the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) which revealed that the economy has slipped into a technical recession.
Figures showed GDP decreasing by 1.4% in Quarter 4 of 2019. This follows a contraction of 0.8% in Quarter 3 of the same year.
Cabinet has approved the implementation of the Township and Rural Entrepreneurship Programme (TREP) through the Township Entrepreneurship Fund.
“This is in line with the economic interventions to harness and grow the township and rural economies. The fund will provide support and ensure self-sustaining economic hubs aligned to the District Development Model in those areas,” the Minister said
PepsiCo empowerment deal
Cabinet has welcomed the ground-breaking worker empowerment deal with PepsiCo as a part of its acquisition of South African food company, Pioneer Foods.
“PepsiCo has committed to jobs, investment, as well as local empowerment and procurement. It also agreed that its Sub-Saharan Headquarters would be located in South Africa,” the Minister said.
He said Pioneer Foods 10 000 workforce is also protected from merger-specific retrenchments and PepsiCo has agreed to maintain aggregate employment levels at current levels for a period of five years.
“Employees in the company will also be issued with R1.6 billion worth of shares in PepsiCo that will be used to acquire a 13% stake in Pioneer Foods within five years,” Mthembu said.
Vodacom Data Prices
Cabinet has also welcomed the announcement by the Competition Commission on the landmark consent agreement reached with Vodacom regarding the reduction of the operator’s data-prices.
Vodacom will cut its data bundle prices by more than 30% across all of its channels as of 1 April 2020.
Vodacom’s decision follows the Competition Commission’s market inquiry report into mobile data services, which found that South Africa’s data prices are excessively high.
The agreement with Vodacom will see cost of data decrease across all monthly bundles, with the 1GB bundle prices dropping from R149 to R99 (a reduction of 34%), with further discounts in the next year.
“Vodacom will also enable data-free access to consumers to certain public interest websites (like Government Communication and Information System (GCIS), the new BizPortal and Wikipedia) and access to South Africans university websites. Further discounts will apply to consumers in over 2000 poorer communities and users will have a ‘basic package’ of two free daily sms messages,” the Minister said. –SAnews.gov.za
