NPC plan in a nutshell

Johannesburg - The national planning commission - headed by former finance minister Trevor Manuel - on Friday released its long-term plan to turn South Africa's economy into one that will create jobs and reduce poverty.

Below are some of the key elements of the plan.

Targets

• To reduce unemployment to 14% by 2020 and 6% by 2030.

• To reduce the number of households living below the poverty line - R418 a month per person - to zero from 39% by 2030.

• The level of inequality as measured by the Gini coefficient should fall to 0.6 by 2030 from 0.7 in 2009.

• The gross domestic product (GDP) should increase by 2.7 times in real terms over the period, requiring average annual GDP growth of 5.4% over the period.

• The savings rate should rise to 25% from 15% currently.

• The level of gross fixed capital formation, or investment, should rise to 30% from 17%.
  

Plans

• To raise exports, focusing on those areas where South Africa already has the endowments and comparative advantage such as mining, construction, mid-skill manufacturing, agriculture and agroprocessing, tourism and business services.

• To improve the functioning of the labour markets to help the economy absorb more labour through reforms and specific proposals concerning dispute resolution and discipline.

• To improve the skills base through better education and vocational training.

• To adopt labour market regulations that simplify dismissal procedures.

• To offer a tax subsidy to employers and unions on entry level wages.

• To reduce the regulatory burden in areas where the private sector is the main investor, such as broadband internet connectivity, to achieve greater capacity and lower prices.

• To construct a new coal line to unlock coal deposits in the Waterberg region, as well as extend existing coal lines in the central basin through private partnerships and upgrade the iron ore line in Saldanha.

• The construction of infrastructure to import liquefied natural gas and accelerate exploration activity to find sufficient domestic gas feed stocks.

• To procure about 20 000 MW of renewable electricity by 2030 and decommission 11 000 MW of ageing coal-fired power stations.