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WE, the representatives of government, business, labour and civil society formations and interest groups from the Mpumalanga Province, meeting at the 1st Provincial Industrial Summit in Dullstroom, from 20th to 21st September 2004, pursuant to a proposal to initiate preparations for a Provincial Growth and Development Summit to address the challenges posed by poverty, unemployment, and underdevelopment in our province;

NOTING that despite the continuing efforts made by our Government, social partners and civil society organizations to promote industrial development in the Province, through the work of the Economic Forum, and programmes established by the Department of Economic Development and Planning, many of our people in the Mpumalanga Province remain poor and thousands are unemployed;

CONCERNED about increasing youth unemployment, lack of access to education, training, skills development, health, proneness to diseases and mainly HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria and other related infectious diseases

FURTHER CONCERNED about the limited success of previously adopted economic and industrial development strategies in the Province and the absence of significant developments in line with black economic empowerment and other measures to reduce economic inequality in our Province,

CONCERNED that while policies and strategies have been developed for the Province their success has been affected by discontinuities and lack of proper monitoring and evaluation,

CONCERNED about the fragmentation of social and economic policies and that employment creation has not been considered as an objective for sustained equitable economic growth and development, and for improving the living conditions of our people in the Mpumalanga Province;

CONVINCED that industrial development can play a critical role in the success of the Mpumalanga Province and its ability to address widespread poverty, unemployment and underemployment,

CONVINCED that our province is sufficiently endowed with natural resources and industrial capabilities that can be tapped for a more rapid economic growth path;

CONVINCED that the Maputo Development Corridor should be the anchor for far-reaching developmental interventions in our province and region in line with the objectives of regional integration and NEPAD;

HAVING UNDERTAKEN a critical review of Mpumalanga’s development profile and assessed the impact of the implementation of the industrial strategy adopted in 1995 with a view to finding ways and means of promoting industrial development in the province in order to create adequate productive and decent employment opportunities for all, as one of the effective and efficient means to alleviate poverty;

THEREFORE COMMIT OURSELVES TO:

DEVELOP an integrated Industrial Strategy for the Mpumalanga province that can address structural constraints to investment and entrepreneurship, promote private-public partnerships, encourage corporate social responsibility, and create an enabling environment for increased production and decent employment opportunities to achieve socio-economic development in our province;

ESTABLISH a sufficiently representative FORUM that can consolidate and support preparations for the Mpumalanga Provincial Growth and Development Summit in February 2005

SUPPORT the existing industrial development programme of the Mpumalanga Provincial Government with its emphasis on value addition and beneficiation, small business development, establishment of sector working groups, and black economic empowerment,

ENHANCE our participation in the management, co-ordination and promotion of the Maputo Development Corridor and other related initiatives

USE existing and proposed Forums to address the identified constraints affecting industrial development in our province, which include:
access to land and warehouse facilities
transport and other input costs
shortage of skills and weak FET infrastructure in the province
access to finance and markets

IMPLEMENT the commitments in this Declaration and publicly report on progress before the end of 2004 ;

REQUEST the MEC for Economic Development and Planning to assume the role of “political champion” for the Declaration and proposed actions and to report at the next Industrial Forum.