Deputy President Mlambo-Ngcuka to Visit Ireland and Portugal

Pretoria - South African Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka will pay an official visit to Portugal and Ireland from Sunday - Tuesday, 12-14 and Tuesday-Thursday, 14-16 November 2006 respectively. Deputy President Mlambo-Ngcuka will be hosted by her counterparts Portuguese Prime Minister José Sócrates and Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern.

Deputy President Mlambo-Ngcuka's delegation will include Minister Naledi Pandor and Deputy Ministers Aziz Pahad, Rob Davies, Ntombazana Botha and Roy Padayachee.

Deputy President Mlambo-Ngcuka's visit comes within the context of South Africa's commitment to consolidate the African agenda, through among others, North-South co-operation for improved trade and market access. In this regard, Portugal will assume the Chairpersonship of the EU from July-December 2007.

Issues on the agenda of discussions between Deputy President Mlambo-Ngcuka and her counterparts are expected to include, among others:

• The status of bilateral political and economic relations between both countries;
• The status of South Africa - European Union relations;
• A briefing on developments on the African continent including the outcomes of the elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo and peacekeeping and conflict resolution in Burundi, Somalia, Sudan and Côte d'Ivoire;
• A briefing on developments within the European Union; and
• Others issues of mutual interest including South Africa's accession to the Non-Permanent seat of the United Nations Security Council.

In Portugal Deputy President Mlambo-Ngcuka will also pay a courtesy call on President Cavaco Silva, the President of Parliament, Jaime Gama, and will participate in a trade and investment seminar with Portuguese and South African business persons.

In Ireland, Deputy President Mlambo-Ngcuka is expected to pay a courtesy call on the President of Ireland, Ms Mary McAleese, Prime Minister Bertie Ahern and hold discussions with Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Justice Michael McDowell, as well as with, Foreign Affairs Minister Dermot Ahern and Minister of State Conor Lenihan.

The main objective of the visit is to further co-operation with Ireland on the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative for South Africa (ASGI-SA) and the Joint Initiative for Priority Skills Acquisition (JIPSA), including skills development, the placement of SA graduates in Irish companies, education co-operation, Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) and Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), tourism, SMME development, expanding South Africa's manufacturing base, as well as co-operation in the agro-industry.

A secondary objective is to learn from the Irish economic experience of the past two decades, during which Ireland was able to leapfrog from being one of the poorest countries in the European Union to one of the richest. This will include an examination of the role of EU structural funding in Ireland's economic development.

The Deputy President will participate in an Education Seminar that will explore co-operation between South Africa and Ireland in various fields of education, as well as in a seminar hosted by the South Africa-Ireland Business Association and the South African Embassy in Dublin under the banner "Economic Prospects for South Africa and Ireland in the context of AsgiSA and JIPSA." The latter seminar will focus on ASGISA priority sectors such as BPO, ICT, the agro-industry and tourism.

Bilateral Economic Relations

Portugal

The most important South African exports to Portugal are coal, steel products, frozen fish, fresh fruit, fruit juices, vegetables, wood and granite. According to the latest figures from the Portuguese Ministry of Economy, South Africa is amongst the top 8 countries with the biggest growth of exports to Portugal during 2005, mostly due to coal imports. South African exports to Portugal increased by 25, 7% (DTI ) during 2005.

South Africa's main imports from Portugal are wood, cork, paper, ceramics, machinery, food, minerals, metal and chemicals. In 2005, Portuguese exports to South Africa registered a 19, 7% decrease (DTI source).

Investment

South African Investment in Portugal

The largest South African company operating in Portugal is the Abadare Cables subsidiary, Alcobre, that manufactures cables for the telecommunications industry.

The SA property company, Homenet, has an office in Lisbon.

SmartPac, a "smart card" company has an agreement with the local company Prism.

The South African company Netcare established a partnership with the Portuguese private health care company, Private Hospitals of Portugal (HPP) on 2 August 2004.

In addition there are also a number of ostrich breeding companies who have strong Southern African connections as well as various small importing and exporting companies especially in the linen and curtaining industry.

Tsumeb (electronic protection systems and integrated network security solutions) is manufacturing in Aveiro, in the north of Portugal.

Carrol Boyes opened its first European shop in Portugal (Cascais) during June 2005.

Portuguese Investment in South Africa

SONAE
AMORIM
PESTANA GROUP
CIMPOR
CONSTRUTORA DO TÂMEGA
CAIXA GERAL DE DEPÓSITOS (CGD)
BANIF
BPI
BANCO PRIVADO-BPP
BES INVESTIMENTO

SA trade with Portugal

Ireland

Ireland

SA Exports To Ireland: R 1,122,108,000 (1,2 billion Rands) (2005)

Imports to South Africa From Ireland: R 4,072,400 (4,07 billion Rands) (2005)

The trade balance has traditionally been very much skewed in Ireland's favour (by a ratio of 3:1). However, this gap has been narrowing in recent years, and the outlook for South African exports is positive. Exports to Ireland have grown steadily in the last four years, from EUR100 million in 2001 to almost EUR160 million at the end of 2005. In 2005, Ireland was South Africa's 41st biggest export market. According to figures from the Embassy in Dublin, imports from Ireland have grown negatively over this period, from EUR400 million in 2001 to just EUR 250 million in 2005.

Furniture appears to be South Africa's largest export to Ireland (27%). This is a new development. Twenty-six percent of exports to Ireland are made up of fertilisers and minerals. Sixteen percent is accounted for by coal, coke and briquettes, while fruit and vegetables account for about 11%. Nine percent of exports is made up of beverages.

Imports to South Africa are dominated by "office machinery & automatic data processing machines". This can be explained by the presence of large multinational computer hardware manufacturing companies in Ireland such as Hewlett Packard, Dell and IBM. Thirteen percent of exports are medical and pharmaceuticals products, which is not surprising, given the number of multinational pharmaceutical firms located in Ireland.

Since 1999 Irish firms have, made several significant investments in South Africa, across a variety of sectors. Among the more well known, Irish entrepreneur, Dr Tony O'Reilly, and Irish Independent Newspapers, have taken over the Argus newspaper group. Irish investors (in particular Nial Mellon) have invested heavily in property in Cape Town. Howard Holdings has purchased eight historic buildings in the centre of Cape Town, which they are converting into a 6 star hotel, conference centre and luxury apartments.

Issued by Ronnie Mamoepa on 082 990 4853

Department of Foreign Affairs
Private Bag X152
Pretoria
0001

9 November 2006