26 Jun 2018

The Ministry of Investment, Trade and Industry (MITI) has set up three apexes through which the ministry is looking to deliver on its mandate, says Minister Bogolo Kenewendo.

Laying out her ministry’s roadmap at a press conference, Ms Kenewendo said the three apexes are Small, Medium and Micro-sized Enterprises (SMMEs), Investment Promotion and Export Development.

“With regards to SMMEs, the ministry is prioritising entrepreneurship and advancement of SMMEs as the catalyst to achieving economic growth, development and economic diversification,” she said.

She noted that some of the key deliverables under the SMMEs apex would be easing of the regulatory burden of SMMEs, development of a supplier directory by sector and region, and her one-ministry approach of developing and implementing a change management framework across the ministry and its parastatals.

Through the second apex, which is the investment promotion and targeted both domestic and foreign companies, Minister Kenewendo said her ministry sought to bring investment opportunities to the attention of potential investors who had the capacity to provide capital, jobs, skills and technology to Botswana thereby contributing to economic growth.

Ms Kenewendo said under the investment apex, some of their goals included developing a national blueprint approach to investment promotion, advocating for the establishment of a sufficiently empowered national clearing house in line with Vision 2036 and strengthening local systems and structures for investor facilitation and aftercare.

Regarding the export development apex, Ms Kenewendo said the ministry would explore export-led growth by promoting export of goods for which the country has a comparative advantage.

“Some of the key deliverables under the export development apex are creation of market access through negotiation of trade agreements with strategic partners, identification of priority sectors according to export readiness and capacity, and development of export incentives,” said Ms Kenewendo.

MITI’s mandate is to create a conducive environment for the promotion of investment, development of sustainable industries and trade with a view to diversifying and growing the economy, creating wealth and employment for all.

Ms Kenewendo said the ministry delivered its mandate through five departments, three units and 11 parastatals.

Therefore, she said  that MITI continued to identify and advocate for the elimination of impediments to trade and “these efforts are geared towards certifying that the prevailing environment avails opportunities for both local and foreign investors to set-up sustainable and competitive business enterprises which are export ready, culminating in economic growth and employment creation.”

MITI projects under NDP 11, according to Ms Kenewendo included among others operationalisation of special economic zones, establishment of a leather park, and implementation of Botswana financial inclusion strategy and establishment of competition and consumer authority as well as competition and consumer tribunal.

Ms Kenewendo further said that concerted efforts continued to be directed towards speeding up implementation of the ongoing reforms to better the country’s rankings and attract foreign direct investment.

“The following legal statutes have been passed through the doing business reforms initiative; Ratification of Electronic Communications and Transactions and the Securities and Electronic Evidence Acts, Review of the Trade Disputes and Deeds Registry Act Legal, Establishment of the Botswana Energy Regulatory Authority, Amendment of the Companies Act, Amendment of the Registration of Business Names Act, Promulgation of the Companies Re-registration Act and Promulgation Business Names Re-registration Act. These legal reforms, promote the use of electronic services platforms," she said.

She further said co-operative development and promotion remained a priority in citizen economic empowerment as well as contributing in poverty eradication and employment creation.

Minister Kenewendo said that there were 271 registered co-operative societies (financial and non-financial) across the country which have created created a total of 130 jobs.

The minister said government continued to support  local manufacturing companies. As a way of promoting the development of the water bottling sector and attracting investment, MITI through the control of Good, Prices and Other Charges Act has put in place measures to restrict the importation of bottled water.

“The regulations restricts importation of bottled water in small quantities and only allows for 10litres or more. The regulations were gazetted on April 6 2018 and will enter into force on August 1 2018,” she said.

Other efforts that assured  MITI support to local manufacturing companies the planned restriction on cement importation which followed  an analysis that showed that the sector had the potential to create employment for Batswana as well as playing a pivotal role in the economic diversification drive..

The proposed restrictions, Ms Kenewendo said  would require that 70 per cent of cement be sourced from local manufacturing companies and 30 per cent be imported adding that the importation would be done through the issuance of import permit after the importer had submitted evidence that satisfied the 70 per cent requirement.

She further said her ministry has put additional restrictions on importation of salt of less than 100kg and exportation of scrap metal before satisfying the local demand.

“In addition, it has been observed that the mandates of some of the parastatals are converging resulting in some overlaps and duplications.

A rationalisation exercise is ongoing in that regard and the exercise will go a long way in eliminating duplication of efforts across the ministry’s parastatals where existent culminating in improved service quality,” she concluded. ENDS