South Africa producing less, importing more

South Africa’s trade deficit with its major trading partners is yawning alarmingly and something has to be done.
Statistics indicate that the country has got quite some homework to handle, if the consistent trend of budget deficits is anything to go by. Just for the month of April 2015, the country recorded a trade deficit of R11.11bn, according to SARS.
The country’s shortcomings have been cruelly exposed in the 2014 trade deficit of R73bn with its BRICS ‘colleague’ China. So serious was the issue such that it was one of the items on the agenda during last month’s meeting between the Chinese Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, and his South African counterpart, Maite Nkoana-Mashabane.
Nkoana-Mashabane  said: “Our two governments are working very hard together to address the negative trade deficit and to ultimately attain a more equitable and mutual trade balance that will be beneficial for further development of two countries.”
One of the measures that the country can adopt to address this challenge is developing industries which can be exporting goods that are globally competitive to reverse the trend.