Special economic zones (SEZs) must change the economies of provinces by developing plans to create jobs and use SEZs as centres of industrialisation, hubs of manufacturing and academies of skills development, Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (dtic) SEZ Advisory Board chairperson Fish Mahlalela has said.
SEZs should provide infrastructure and unlock opportunities for small, medium-sized and microenterprises that are critical in creating these jobs.
Mahlalela noted this in a statement following his address at a two-day SEZ CEO Forum, at the Coega SEZ, in Gqeberha, in the Eastern Cape, which aimed to align the implementation plans of the SEZs with the five-year implementation plan of the new Spatial Industrial Development Strategy (SIDS).
“SEZs are a key element to address the unemployment and youth unemployment crisis. SEZs should assist in intervening and addressing this crisis. There is a huge expectation for the SEZs to ensure they contribute and assist the country in addressing this problem of unemployment, especially youth unemployment,” he stated.
Further, CEOs of SEZs must set up skills academies in all the SEZs as part of the new SEZs model advocated by the SIDS, he said.
