‘Let’s do business’: Ramaphosa opens investment doors for Spanish government

“South Africa is open for business.”

This is the message President Cyril Ramaphosa had for a Spanish business delegation led by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez on Thursday.

Sánchez, who was accompanied by his minister of industry, trade and tourism Reyes Maroto on an official visit to the Union Buildings in Pretoria, observed the signing of three memoranda of understanding, including on cooperation in education, science and technology, defence, arts, culture and sports.

Speaking to business leaders from both countries at the Capital Menlyn Maine hotel in Pretoria, Ramaphosa said South Africa wanted to see higher levels of foreign direct investment by Spanish companies.

“South Africa is the 12th highest destination for Spanish exports, and Spain is the 20th highest destination for South African exports.”

There are 150 Spanish companies invested in South Africa creating more than 20,000 jobs, largely in infrastructure development, renewable energy, finance, tourism, textiles, IT, metals and mining.

Bilateral trade between the two countries almost quadrupled in the past 10 years.

Ramaphosa said in 2021, Spain was South Africa’s fourth largest export destination in the European Union (EU) and fifth largest source of imports from the EU. Exports increased from R14.9bn in 2020 to R28.5bn in 2021.

“South Africa and the kingdom of Spain have a well-established bilateral economic relationship, which provides a firm platform for growth and expansion.”

Ramaphosa said South Africa’s focus is to increase the export of value-added goods and services to Spain.

He said this was in the areas of mining equipment and technologies, advanced manufacturing, alternative energy equipment, pharmaceuticals, agricultural products and food processing equipment.

“Spain’s investment into South Africa is concentrated in the renewable energy, tourism, steel, automotive, water and agro-processing sectors,” he said, adding he hopes to see “massive expansion” of renewable energy in South Africa.

On his economic reconstruction and recovery plan, Ramaphosa said the country has prioritised spending in infrastructure, the unemployment stimulus package and local industrialisation.

“To support a rapid economic rebound, South Africa has prioritised interventions to drive industrial growth and the expansion of energy generation capacity.”

He said he hopes to collaborate with Spain in the textile industry.

The president said South Africa was in the process of implementing a range of interventions to rapidly expand the country’s energy generation capacity.

“The national power utility Eskom is being split into three separate entities for generation, transmission and distribution. We are increasing the procurement of renewable energy, upscaling the use of gas and battery storage, and removing regulatory restrictions on self-generation,” he said.

He assured his guests that regulatory reform was also underway to liberalise the electricity generation market to make it more competitive and to attract private sector investment.

Ramaphosa said South Africa was also undertaking far-reaching reforms in other network industries such as telecommunications, ports and rail and water infrastructure.

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