Thank you very much for affording me the opportunity to address you this morning as part of what has now has become a very strong and developed relationship between the Provincial Government of the Western Cape and the Bavarian Government, and underpinned by equally close relations between the Protestant Academy of Tutzing and the Eumenical Foundation of South Africa.

Minister Sinne and Minister Muller, I think that we are starting to witness the very positive results which this dialogue has brought and I would like to believe that part of our success has been that people from civil society, the sub-national level and national level of government are engaging each other on the very real challenges which our constituents and humanity face everyday.

I also bring very warm wishes from our Premier, Ebrahim Rasool.

Our challenge over the next few days is to exchange views and deliberate on the fascinating world of technology innovation and how human endeavour must be harnessed to render the world a better place. We should commit to each other that this interaction must be premised on the principles of inclusivity of all of the world's citizens and their very disparate needs.

On the 17 th of February this year our Premier, Ebrahim Rasool, when addressing the Ecumenical Foundation of South Africa gala dinner, spoke of the ' material roots of what creates exclusivity ' and asked how do we create the ' politics of inclusivity' . In his opinion the critical cause of global inequality was the economy.

Over the last 25 years we have witnessed how the rapid changes, brought by the winds of globalization, have impacted on our markets and societies . We should also have the courage and frankness to say that while globalization has in certain instances made a positive contribution to the world, in many countries especially in the developing world globalization has been a negative phenomenon and in certain cases has caught societies unprepared.

I would like to propose that our discussion on technological innovation should be framed in the context of the political and economic evolution of our globe. It would be critical for us as government to have this as a perspective to inform our responses to the challenges of technological innovation in today's world.

The central thrust of my argument will be that the history of economic development and technological advances has led to a global structural exclusivity between the developed and developing nations. Access to technology, knowledge, innovation, and development remain critical divides in our globe today.

For many people in the developing world colonialism and industrialization served to entrench inequality and underdevelopment. Public and economic policy went to grave lengths to entrench this and was maintained through sub-standard education, a lack of access to technology, and in many African countries the economy was stratified and largely primary sector driven serving mainly the needs of the wealthier industrialized nations.

This global inequality continues during the second wave of technological advancement through the introduction of Information and Communication Technology, the so-called Digital revolution which as we know also led to the so-called Digital Divide between rich and poor nations.

So while our developed nations are racing towards the technological future it is clear that for a large majority of developing nations we are still in the starting blocks of the industrialization phase.

I think that it is safe to say that in this multi-polar world that we live in there remains a global inequality that needs to be addressed . If we fail to engage on these matters then we will see a rise in exclusion and its corollary - heightened feelings of marginalization .

It is bearing this context in mind that our government has had to frame its response. How do we ensure that we remain globally competitive in a world that is rapidly changing, moving towards strong technology, knowledge and innovation-based economies while at the same time ensuring that we are getting the basics right in dealing with the key challenges of poverty and underdevelopment? How do we meet the demands of this new globalised world while at the same time meeting the objectives of the Millennium Development Goals?

Since the advent of democracy in 1994 the South African government has maintained that economic and social development is our key policy tool for ensuring greater equality amongst our people. However, we have also acknowledged that development is a constant process of social change that requires the participation of all stakeholders.

We also realised that should we fail to deal with the divisive politics of exclusion, which we had inherited from the dark days of Apartheid, then we would witness the rise of marginalisation and our lofty ambition, which is codified in the Preamble to our Constitution and states that 'South Africa belongs to all who live in it, united in diversity,' would never see the light of day.

In our first ten years of democracy it became evident that the global economy had taken on new levels of sophistication which we were really not aware of. We knew that our domestic market was commodity rich and that we had pockets of excellence which we believed could grow and become globally competitive once the political, economic and cultural isolation which was imposed on us was lifted.

At this time we most probably underestimated the global reach of corporations, we also did not fully understand the sheer pervasiveness of international banks, the complex nature of the global financial system and we missed the early warning signs of the eminent technological revolution of the 1990's.

However even though we were faced with both these international complexities together with the very real need to rebuild and unite our country, we can be proud of the record of achievements both socially and economically of our new democratic government. We have achieved macro-economic stability with growth rates averaging at 4.5% over the past years as well as a strong social delivery programme which has seen millions of people gain access to basic services such as water, electricity and sanitation.

When we came into government in the Western Cape in 2004 we managed, through research, to identify new economic opportunities that were being created by globalisation and the search for cost arbitrage, in a sense trying to harness the winds of globalisation!

It became evident to us that the global environment had transformed into a knowledge economy and we realised that our economic success would rest on our ability to compete in these new knowledge sectors . We also knew that Cape Town and the Western Cape had rapidly emerged as a centre of excellence in design, creativity and innovation

An important finding that repeated itself in our research was that our province was blessed with a number of substantial talent pools . We have a high number of secondary school leavers, most of whom had English either as a first or second language, and four Higher Education Institutions with strong research capacity.

These findings were important because they helped us realise through sector development in our clusters and with the correct skills development programmes we could train a number of these talent pools and match them with the new economic opportunities we had identified.

Using the sector clustering methodology and prioritising key sectors, we were able to create new economic opportunities in the Oil and Gas Services, Call Centre and BPO, ICT, Creative and Design Sectors. We have also laid the foundation in partnership with the National Department of Science and Technology for the Biotechnology and Tooling sectors.

These successes have validated our approach and deepened our understanding of how to identify, through solid research, new opportunities which play to our comparative advantages in the Western Cape . A number of years ago our research indicated that more investment was being directed to the offshore oil fields off the west coast of Africa .

As a result of this, the demand for new rigs outstripped the capacity of established yards to build and service them. We have now positioned Cape Town as a major service hub for oil rigs and our coastal port of Saldanha, approximately 100km from Cape Town, will begin to construct new rigs this year. Last year we witnessed a significant investment of R1.7 billion, by a German company called MAN Ferrostaal, for the construction of a Fabrication Yard in Saldanha and this will be a critical catalyst for our nascent oil and gas sector.

So we set about embracing the concept of business accelerators and incubators and we have witnessed remarkable success in our biotechnology, medical devices and ICT business incubators. We have also strongly encouraged product and process (TPP) innovations which seeks to implement new products and processes and significant technological improvements in production of goods and service as well as their production processes

However, if one were to take software development as an example it became evident that many of the systems and software products operated on a source code that is deemed proprietary and copyrighted. So it becomes extremely difficult to develop new programmes or enhance that software product if you do not even have access to the language or source code.

Cape Town has also experienced this difficulty and the ICT sector has begun to embrace free open source software (FOSS) and is now developing very interesting products, especially those applications that can operate on both PCs and mobile phones.

If we turn to the biotechnology sector we acknowledged that our province has a rich indigenous floral and fauna biodiversity, coastal and marine systems as well as a genetically diverse human population which is crucial to medical discovery.

The Western Cape is also home to a very special floral kingdom which is recognized under UNESCO Treaty as common property of all human kind and I refer to the unique Cape Floral kingdom and Succulent Karoo kingdom.

We believe that new scientific discovery resulting from the eco-prospecting our biodiversity is very real. Most plants in the Cape Floral Kingdom can not be cultivated outside of our province and to date much work is being done in this regard.

However, the majority of private sector biotechnology companies in the Western Cape are heavily reliant on donor funding, the reasons for this are numerous but the most apparent are high acquisitions costs of technology, the long lead times to the production of revenue generating products or services and especially the high risks associated with this sector.

So as a government we have committed ourselves to mobilising domestic capital, establishing private-public-partnerships and are keen to enter into cooperative agreements, knowledge sharing and funding programmes with foreign states and organisations.

We recently witnessed the launch of the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB) at the Groote Schuur Hospital . This centre is the first of its kind on the African continent and is one of only 3 international biotechnology laboratories in the world and aims to conduct innovative research in life sciences for the benefit of developing countries.

The Centre, is dedicated to advancing of research and training in molecular biology and biotechnology, it aims to strengthen the research capability of its members through training, funding programmes, advisory services and represents a comprehensive approach to promoting biotechnology internationally.

Technological transfers from more developed states and the lack of strength in our national innovation system remain serious challenges. We have witnessed a shift in thinking around innovation and cluster of partnership programmes have been identified.

Our national flagship project is the Co-operation Framework on Innovation Systems (COFISA), which aims to strengthen SA's national system of innovation and is the product of a bilateral agreement with Finland , who will contribute R30m to the project.

Ladies and gentlemen, I have tried to illustrate how our Province has responded to the changing demands for new technologies, innovation and technological innovation and, in so doing, using this as a platform to address our critical challenges of poverty and unemployment and to bring greater inclusivity in our province to realise our vision of the Western Cape as " A Home for All!"

It is clear that the Western Cape government has positioned itself to deal with both the new global challenges as well as simultaneously dealing with the legacies of colonialism and Apartheid. We have tried to generate economic growth in our province while at the same time ensuring that the benefits of this growth are shared by all. We are confident about achieving our national Accelerated and Shared Growth (ASGISA) objectives and the target of 6% growth by 2014.

However, our attempts at ensuring sustainable and shared growth will be undermined by the stalling of the global trade negotiations and the removal of crucial trade barriers. Added to this, the sophistication of the global capital market has brought the development of new financial instruments and new risks (such as the recent sub-prime lending crisis), we have also been eclipsed by the technological revolution and we struggle to make gains on the digital and technological divide and we also struggle to find solutions to new diseases.

This remains a challenge for South Africa and the rest of the continent. To give you a sense of the enormity of the problem let me share some statistics relating the 9 SADC countries. Out of a total population of 134 million people, and with a total GDP of $288 billion only 20.5% of these people have access to cell phones and 3.3% have access to landlines.

This clearly demonstrates the reality that poorer nations find themselves at a dramatic technological disadvantage and will certainly not be able to cross the digital divide without assistance. So we have to ask the fundamental question: How do these people access the internet, which has become so basic to the everyday lives of citizens in the developed world?

How do we compete in a knowledge-based global economy with this inability to access and share information. How do the poor do business in such a disadvantaged environment? And how can we expect innovation if basic access is not available?

Added to this all 9 countries, and one can apply this to the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa, are dependent on importation of capital goods, machinery and equipment from the developed world which illustrates a dependency for technology from outside of these countries.

Amidst these complexities of technological discrimination a new challenge has arisen which will place a further burden on the developing nations.

Climate change has become one of the most important agenda points on the global stage, dominating the discourse at every level of the world's multilateral institutions such as the United Nations, the G8, and the World Economic Forum.

While the largest emitters of greenhouse gases come from the developed nations the greatest impacts will be felt by the poorer nations. And therefore we must assert that Climate Change is a Poverty issue!

Sir Nicholas Stern, Adviser to the British Government on the Economics of Climate Change and Development stated in his report, that was released in October 2006 that "our actions over the coming few decades could create risks of major disruption to economic and social activity, later in this century and in the next, on a scale similar to those associated with the great wars and the economic depression of the first half of the 20th century"

The challenge therefore for poorer nations and the African continent specifically is enormous. It has been acknowledged that the African continent will not have the capacity to respond the challenges that climate change will bring. Access to technology is critical to both mitigation and adaptation strategies. We are therefore facing the third and new wave of the technological divide.

While the Kyoto Protocol commits developed nations to technology transfer and the use of the Adaptation Fund to assist developing nations, very little of these commitments have been fulfilled. Only 3% of the Adaptation Fund has been spent on the African continent and very few technology transfer commitments have been realised.

The Western Cape Government has done research into the impacts on Climate Change in our Province. The findings indicate that the Western Cape will be one of the most vulnerable provinces in South Africa and will experience and in fact have already started experiencing drought, flooding and fires. We have responded by developing a Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Plan which we have begun to implement. A critical priority is the promotion of Renewable Energy and we have set a target of 15% by 2014. The challenge however for us to be able to implement our programme is dependent on our ability to develop and access new technologies.

Our study has also pointed out that we could face a number of new economic challenges!

Should countries in Europe , which are also adapting to climate change and who rank as our largest trading partners, begin to move towards selling products with a carbon-neutral status, i.e. reducing the food-miles, then a large segment of our export market could be lost and significant job losses in the agri-processing sector

Similarly should the developed world introduce the notion of a carbon tax on air travel, aimed at discouraging long-haul tourists then we could lose a sizeable number of tourist and their tourist dollars and the associated job multiplier that is so important in this sector.

We understand that there are risks and challenges, but the government of the Western Cape has adopted an approach of looking at the new economic opportunities that Climate Change can bring and we call this the Environmental Economy. It embraces areas of intervention such as the promotion of a recycling economy, renewable energy, CDM opportunities, etc. Current estimates are that by 2050 the global market for low-carbon energy products is likely to be worth at least $500bn.

As the Stern Report asserts 'The transition to a low-carbon economy will bring challenges for competitiveness but also opportunities for growth. For the economy as a whole, there will be benefits from innovation that will offset some of these costs.'

Very often the public sees the utilisation of renewable energy sources as a cumbersome act of compliance. Our strategy is to create the incentive on the demand side by stimulating the supply side. In this next year we will announce an exciting package of interventions that will catalyse the renewable energy sector.

We know that the impacts of climate change are not evenly distributed; they will strike the poorest and most vulnerable countries and communities the earliest. So we have said that climate change is a poverty issue that requires us to act now and act decisively!

Conclusion

In concluding I would like to encourage participants in this Dialogue session to debate the challenges of the technological divides I have addressed in this input. How do we find solutions to these problems? How do we forge new partnerships that help us close the gap and ensure that we achieve the goals of universal access?

How do we mobilise resources and knowledge to those countries and regions that require assistance? How do we deal with the challenge of achieving our Millennium Development Goals while laying the basis for the emergence of the new knowledge and technology-based economies? How do we use technological innovation to deal with poverty and to improve the quality of life of all of our people? And finally, is there an opportunity for us to use technological innovation to build a truly inclusive world - a Home for All!

I would like to thank the Protestant Academy of Tutzing and the Ecumenical Foundation of Southern Africa and the Bavarian Government for providing this critical platform for dialogue and solution-finding. I am certain that the participants present will enhance the discourse and find exciting and innovative solutions to some of our challenges. I look forward to the engagement.