By Nangamso Mabindla
26 May 2005

THE Provincial Growth Development Plan was a mirror of what the New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad) set out to do on our poverty-stricken continent, said Andrew Murray, the chief executive of the Eastern Cape Socio-Economic Consultative Council.

He was addressing delegates at the three-day Nepad Trade and Investment Conference in East London. The gathering is being held to find ways to attract foreign direct investment to Africa; to implement policies conducive to economic growth; to improve the quality of trade-related technical assistance; and to build capacity on the continent.

"Like Nepad, our [growth plan] aims to be pro-poor in its approached to solving challenges facing the province and its people. We aim to empower the province's poor just like Nepad wants to eradicate poverty in Africa," Murray said.

One of the main aims of the plan was to develop a strategy to alleviate poverty and promote economic growth in the province. "With this in mind I would like to encourage us to form strong partnerships with Nepad and share ideas on how we will go about eliminating poverty on the continent."

Outlining the plan's objectives, Murray said the government aimed to halt poverty and to ensure that people stopped depending on social grants. "We want our people to be self sustaining and that's what Nepad also wants for the people of Africa. Our people should stop being too reliant on social grants. They need to be self-sustaining."

Shifting his attention to the targets set for development, he said the provincial government wanted to focus on strong economic growth, create jobs and improve service delivery.

The provincial government wanted to maintain an economic growth rate of between 5 percent and 8 percent a year, and to reduce by 60 percent to 80 percent the number of households living below the poverty line, by 2014.

"We also want to establish food self-sufficiency in the province by 2014 and improve the literacy rate in the province by 50 percent by 2014," Murray said.

It had other targets, but it needed to strengthen partnerships with potential donors.

Murray invited potential donors attending the conference to the first Provincial Growth Development Plan donor meeting, to be held in East London on Friday, May 27.