Cape Town - Opposition parties have criticised the latest Western Cape Provincial Economic Review and Outlook 2022/23 (PERO) tabled on Tuesday, for “ignoring” crucial issues that impact the well-being of residents.
Finance and Economic Opportunities MEC Mireille Wenger on Tuesday tabled PERO at the Provincial Parliament, with job creation, safety, and well-being top priorities.
“This document also makes clear some of the challenges that face South Africa and, by extension, the Western Cape. This week, those challenges are as stark as ever before as we face an unprecedented energy crisis,” said Wegner.
She said the province was on the pathway from recovery to growth following the Covid-19 pandemic which caused significant job losses.
The PERO projects sluggish growth in South Africa, with growth rates of 1.7 per cent in 2022 and 0.3 per cent in 2023, with the Western Cape expanding at a higher rate of 2.2 per cent in 2022, before dipping to the national growth rate of 0.3 per cent in 2023.
“As we move on this pathway from recovery to growth, we need to de-couple our province’s economic growth trajectory from the country’s by delivering break-out economic growth that creates jobs.
In doing so, we need to ensure that we prioritise, doing more with less, and use the policy levers that we have available to us to effect this rapid change. We also need to enable partnerships, especially with the private sector, and embrace innovation,” she said.
Wenger also touched on the province being energy resilient, as well as attracting high levels of renewable energy investment.
She also said there has been a recent positive uptick in building plans approved in the province.
ANC spokesperson on Finance, Economic Development and Tourism Nomi Nkondlo said they want the research document to give a coalface of facts even in those aspects where the provincial government is failing.
“This PERO yet again proves that the DA government continues to ignore issues which impact on well being such as food insecurity, poverty, and quality of service delivery. The PERO has shown that unemployment increased by 116 000 or 15% to 891 000.
While we note the reference made to moving from recovery to growth, we are concerned that no mention was made as to how growth in the agriculture sector has benefited farm workers,” she said.
GOOD party MPL Shaun August said to drive and champion mass employment, all avenues must be explored.
“Promising industries such as aquaculture, the circular economy and horticulture have shown great potential in which SME’s can be established, operate and become sustainable businesses to positively contribute to our national unemployment crisis.
With all this in mind, ineffective policy, economic bias and clouded judgement from this provincial administration is keeping locks on a lucrative sector, informal trade, that could grow local development, secure mass employment in those corners of the province that remains completely overlooked and develop communities that DA-policy is perpetually keeping poor,“ he said.
Cape Times