CEO Mxolisi Matshamba shares the corporation's thinking on promoting the province in the current economic climate.

Like all investment promotion agencies across the world, current negative market sentiment has also challenged the Eastern Cape. Furthermore, previous incentives like low electricity and labour rates have also been lessened over time.

However, investors remain drawn to countries which offer robust infrastructure and less red tape when opening and doing business.

Certainly, in the case of infrastructure, the Eastern Cape offering is ever-improving.  Rail, road, airport and port infrastructure have improved significantly over the past 12 months. Sizeable investments have been made into the province's two industrial development zones, which has also resulted in the province's third port and the only transshipment port of its kind in the southern hemisphere. In each of these cases, this infrastructure has drawn an encouraging number of local and global investors.

However, there is much more work to be done and these challenges have mobilized the province into taking a much more robust approach to understand its markets and more particularly, its targeted investors.

The cornerstone of any investment promotion agency is an understanding of its markets and hence research is paramount.  Other initiatives include improving inputs in policy making to ensure that the voice of the Eastern Cape is heard. 

Working together with other government departments as well as municipalities, there are also initiatives to streamline activities for investors who wish to set up a business. 

The difficulty of setting up a business is the number one obstacle mentioned by investors as hampering the establishment of a new business. While the Saudi Arabian example of being able to set up a business within 24 hours is highly desirable, South Africa's norm of 32 days is improving. The 2009 ranking shows an improvement of three places over 2008.

Other incentives in place to put the Eastern Cape more firmly on the investment map include robust marketing plans of key sectors such as automotive, agro-processing, business processing outsourcing, tourism, and manufacturing as well as beefing up the research capacity. Research is the cornerstone of the marketing function and should translate into how these sectors can be better marketed.