DTI rethinks incentive schemes

Leonard Neill THE DEPARTMENT of Trade & Industry's export promotion division has come under fire in recent months from companies which have found it more difficult to obtain funding under incentive schemes, especially in the primary market research (PMR) assistance fund. The difficulty, says export marketing and investment assistance director Christiaan Saaiman, is due to the abuse of the fund, as well as a refocusing of the organisation to provide more funding for those programmes in EMIA which offer a higher rate of return. He quotes the example of South Africans exhibiting at national pavilions where, on average, between R40 and R70 is generated for every rand spent. Hence funding at these pavilions is set to increase, as is funding of overseas trade missions, he says. The number of national pavilions supported will be increased from 14 to 30 in the current financial year "This is the most successful programme in the incentive scheme because of its impact on export sales and the expanding of the export base. Benefits to black firms will also be increased from January next year in line with the department's black economic empowerment policies." But all funding now has to be balanced and more strictly monitored in the face of increasing fraud, he said.