Africa-Press – Botswana. The SADC region needs a paradigm shift to accelerate the pace of industrialisation, achieve an impactful structural transformation, and meet its goals.
This was stated by United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) acting executive secretary, Dr Antonio Pedro at the just ended 43rd Ordinary Summit of SADC Heads of States and Governments in Luanda, Angola.
Dr Pedro said the transformation to digitalise southern Africa must be accelerated in order to stimulate innovation and foster economic growth and job creation.
“As a first step, we need to establish an ecosystem for transformational change and leadership that brings together the government, private sector, and other stakeholders in quality dialogues and co-creation of home-grown solutions,” he said.
He highlighted the need to concentrate efforts on de-risking investments and clarifying the location and size of investment opportunities in the sub-region.
Dr Pedro noted that the SADC region should devote time to creating an enabling environment for both foreign direct investment and domestic investors adding that the emergence of a strong and competitive small and medium-sized enterprise sector would create employment.
He noted that that SADC was among the first regions to conceptualise and work on development corridors. Dr Petro cited human and financial capital as essential factors to achieving sustainable industrialisation. To this end, he said it was equally important for the education systems to be aligned with market and societal needs.
“This applies not only to tertiary but also to technical and vocational education and training. In this effort, governments can nurture and foster partnerships between industries and educational institutions to facilitate the transfer of knowledge and technology and ensure that curricula align better with the needs of the industrial sector,” he stated.
Dr Pedro emphasized the importance of investing in science, technology, and innovation as an enabler to move away from the resource extractives model that characterises most of the mineral-rich countries.
He encouraged member states to transform into green industrialisation cautioning of the difficulties with exporting value-added goods to jurisdictions that are introducing carbon borders.
He said SADC should leverage the many opportunities presented by disruptions in the global supply chains, the energy transition and the regional and continental free trade area agreements.
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