The trade and industry department (dti) will lead a Special Economic Zones (SEZs) investment roadshow to Mersin and Ankara in Turkey from September 17 to 20, the dti said on Sunday.
The objective of the roadshow was for SEZ operators to showcase investment opportunities to potential investors in Turkey, the dti said in a statement.
The roadshow would include seminars, one-on-one meetings, and visit to Turkish SEZs. The roadshow would also be used as an opportunity to learn from the experiences of Turkish SEZs and to strengthen collaboration between the two countries on the promotion of SEZs in Turkey.
Turkey was chosen because it was one of the countries that had developed successful SEZs. To date, Turkey had developed 18 SEZs, which attracted over 19,000 operational companies, investing over US20 billion. These SEZs had created over 70,000 jobs. Turkey was also one of the countries in the world that had managed to drive successful manufacturing of clothing and textiles. There was great value that South Africa could get from Turkey, the dti said.
"South Africa is one of the countries that have recently introduced the SEZ programme to drive industrialisation and investment promotion. Since the introduction of the SEZ programme in 2016, there has been a significant growth in operational investment as well as secured investments that are currently setting up their factories in SEZs."
The Turkey roadshow followed a successful SEZs investment roadshow on September 5 and 6 in Chengdu in China. The China roadshow was undertaken in partnership with the Chinese government through the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), as well as the Bank of China (BOC).
To date, 10 SEZs had been designated in South Africa, and they had attracted 122 operational investments with a cumulative private investment value of over R16.23 billion. This figure was likely to increase further in the near future, given the 61 secured investments with a value of over R33.6 billion currently setting up their factories in various SEZs, the dti said. – ANA.
