Five years since inception, with a vision to create jobs, develop capacity and reduce crime, stakeholders celebrate the Business Trust achieving its objectives and providing a model for collaboration between business and government along the way.
"It's a story all South Africans need to hear because the results of five years of the Business Trust clearly illustrate that together, we can do what we can't do on our own. And that this is the way to meet our country's biggest challenges," explains Whittaker.
The President's Big Business Working Group (BBWG) was established, as an informal forum for business and Government leaders to meet under the chairmanship of President Mbeki.
With its partners, the Business Trust has worked tirelessly to increase tourism and investment, develop schooling and reduce crime. The administration cost was kept to less than 3%.
The Business Trust model mobilizes funds on a basis where all companies contribute on the same formula. The largest donation was over R100 million, while the smallest equaled R2500. On that basis, 145 companies committed over R900 million for deployment over the five-year period. Programmes co-funded, mainly by the government, eventually totaled R1.9 billion for the five years.
The Trust stimulated the demand for jobs by helping to attract increasing numbers of tourists to the country through an effective international marketing programme; it improved the level of skills and service in the tourism sector by supporting a large-scale training programme; and enabled tourism enterprises to respond to the demand for jobs by supporting the development and growth of those enterprises.
In real terms: 50 new colleges were established, one million disadvantaged children helped to read better, 18 000 teachers trained, three million books provided and a 35% improvement in the Maths pass rate secured at needy schools.
The incidence of malaria was cut by 70% in targeted communities; one million new tourists were attracted to South Africa and 65 000 job opportunities were created through tourism activity. The Trusts Tourism Enterprise Programme helped to convert 15 000 of those opportunities into actual jobs through its work with small firms.
Support for work in the Justice system saw, among other things, a 40% reduction in waiting trial time for prisoners.
"The Business Trust began with the intention of bringing the challenges of development to business and the resources and logic of business to development. We hoped in this way to improve the lives of poor people, while enhancing trust and building co-operative relations between business and government. Perhaps the clearest signal of success was the Presidents proposal that the Trust should continue for another five years as part of the process of reconciliation, reconstruction, development and growth," says Whittaker.
In celebration of The Business Trust's five productive years, the third Business Trust Long Run, South Africa's biggest corporate event, is a relay event of professional SA runners, employees and leaders of business and government, running across the breadth of the country to demonstrate the value of partnerships.
The Business Trust Long Run, which is the current holder of the Guinness Book of records 1000 mile record for a relay team, starts on the 12th of October with a 42 kilometre run in the spectacular Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park - in the North West of the country, travels through the Cradle of Mankind, and ends in the famous Kruger National Park in the East on the 25th of October 2004.
