OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Thursday 11.40am.
THE government will take what steps it can to improve the domestic economy, including facilitating lower interest rates, cutting taxes and improving savings, Trade Minister Alec Erwin said on Wednesday.
”We will continue the complex process of managing the interest rate down so as to increase investment, particularly in small and medium enterprises,” he told the media while outlining his department’s programme for the year.
”We will also continue to improve the tax regime to support investment and savings,” he added.
Gross domestic product is forecast to rise by more than three percent this year after just creeping above one percent in 1999, but unemployment is expected to remain at a stubbornly and unacceptably high level of over 30%.
Erwin said that while foreign direct investment is very important to fuel the national economy, it is also necessary to stimulate domestic investment — particularly through promotion of small businesses.
”There is a need to encourage saving and to provide for easily accessible means of doing this,” he said.
”The changing structures of our banking sector are being evaluated to see if we can improve intermediation between small savers and small investors,” he added, also pledging to keep unit labour costs under control. — Reuters