Tasez

The partnership between government and business, now in its third year, must deliver practical, delivery-focused mechanisms that achieve measurable results in stimulating economic growth and job creation, President Cyril Ramaphosa emphasises in his latest newsletter, From the Desk of the President, published on 24 August 2026. Last week, we launched the third phase of the partnership between government and business to drive faster inclusive economic growth and create jobs.  This partnership is but one example of the collaborative initiatives that government has with social partners such as labour, business and civil society. Over the last few years, we have forged partnerships across society to tackle a number of economic and social challenges, from the COVID-19 pandemic and gender-based violence to reviving and building key industries. When we established the government-business partnership in 2023, our country faced severe crises that threatened our economic progress. Load shedding, freight logistics constraints and persistent security challenges weighed heavily on businesses, workers and households alike. We recognised that while the state must set policy, regulate and deliver public goods, the expertise and resources of the private sector are critical if we are to build a resilient economy. Together, we resolved to address our nation’s most binding economic constraints.   While the first two phases of the partnership were about stabilisation and structural reform, the third phase focuses on areas of the economy that can stimulate greater growth and job creation.  When we started, our immediate objective was to respond to the crises in electricity and logistics. We brought on board private sector capabilities through the National Energy Crisis Committee and undertook joint efforts in freight transport to halt the decline in these critical network industries.  We mobilised support from business for the structural reforms that government had embarked on and drew on its resources to build institutional capacity in the state. This work, together with the efforts of the relevant government departments and public entities, has helped us to achieve more than 400 days without load shedding. This has been possible thanks to a remarkable turnaround in generation led by Eskom, a rapid expansion in private generation capacity and significant progress toward a competitive electricity market.  Operational performance at key ports has been strengthened through strategic partnerships and freight rail corridors have now been opened to private operators.  The partnership has also contributed to South Africa’s removal from the Financial Action Task Force grey list, prompting credit rating agencies to upgrade their outlooks and ratings for the country. These are real outcomes that demonstrate that social partnerships are more than meetings and presentations; they are practical, delivery-focused mechanisms that achieve measurable results.   While the work done to date has laid a firm foundation, our growth rate remains too low to absorb the millions of South Africans seeking work. With around 8.5 million unemployed citizens by the official rate and roughly 300,000 net new work-seekers entering the labour force each year, we must accelerate our pace.  The third phase of the partnership sets a clear target of lifting South Africa’s GDP growth above 3% a year and contributing toward the creation of one million new jobs by 2030.   To achieve this, Phase Three expands our focus across three pillars designed to convert macroeconomic stability into improvements in the lives of our people.  The first pillar focuses on sustaining our core economic enablers by completing the unbundling of Eskom, building new transmission lines, fully operationalising the wholesale electricity market and expanding private train operations on our rail network.  The second pillar unlocks growth in industries with substantial employment potential. These include mining, agriculture and agro-processing, tourism, and infrastructure. This includes rolling out the new mining cadastre system to boost mineral exploration, streamlining visa systems to attract international tourists, expanding agricultural export markets, and scaling up public-private infrastructure investment.  The third pillar focuses on areas that boost confidence across society and in the economy. Confidence reinforces growth, and faster growth fosters more confidence. Areas that we will focus on are tackling crime and corruption, extending partnership models to improve municipal service delivery, and backing specialised forensic capacities to accelerate high-impact prosecutions against organised syndicates. We will scale up our work to create employment and livelihood opportunities for young people. This includes joint efforts to increase youth placement in entry-level jobs, supported by increased employment incentives and work-seeker support. We will sustain and expand effective public employment programmes, while working with business to improve the transition of youth into sustained earning opportunities. The overarching lesson of these past three years is that no single sector of society can resolve South Africa’s economic challenges in isolation. Government brings an electoral mandate, regulatory authority and policy direction. Business brings investment, technical skills and resources.  When we align our capabilities around clear, measurable objectives, we move our country forward. This approach reflects and strengthens our broader democratic tradition of social dialogue and cooperation.  By deepening these social partnerships and maintaining our collective momentum, we will convert confidence into investment, growth and jobs. And we will convert transformational reforms into shared prosperity for all.