South Africa – According to Trade and Industry Deputy Minister Elizabeth Thabethe, South African businesses should seize trade and investment opportunities in Benin.

The deputy minister is in Benin on the first Outward Selling and Investment Mission that kicked off with a seminar on Monday.

“Our business community must seize the trade and investment opportunities available in Benin, which the two governments are facilitating through the necessary enabling framework.

“South Africa has identified opportunities for collaboration in agriculture and agro-processing, infrastructure (rail, road, Air and sea ports, and power generation) as well as Small, Medium and Micro Enterprise (SMME) development and financing,” said Thabethe as she delivered a keynote address at a trade and investment seminar in Cotonou.

The Benin and South African governments are in the process of creating good trade relations which will benefit businesses in both countries.

“Our countries signed the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Economic and Technical Cooperation in November 2011. The MoU is aimed at identifying specific areas that will further deepen our technical, trade and industrial cooperation arrangement. In order to ensure that the MoU is implemented, the two countries established the Joint Trade and Investment Committee (JTIC) in February 2012,” she said.

The deputy minister also urged businesses to work on making trade between the two countries more balanced as it is currently in South Africa’s favour. In 2011, bilateral trade amounted to R310 million.

“This comprised of imports from Benin of R10 million and exports to Benin of R297 million. South Africa mainly exported vegetable products such as fruit, nuts, peels of citrus fruit, melons and oil seed, grain and seed to Benin, whereas we imported residues, wastes of food industry and animal fodder from Benin,” she said.