Did SONA augur well for SA boatbuilding? Short answer – no. Few would have expected President Ramaphosa to mention boatbuilding in his State of the Nation Address. But it would have been nice to hear the word ‘maritime’ or ‘ocean’. Sadly these words did not feature in Ramaphosa’s lengthy speech.
No doubt the president has a long list of matters of national importance, and boatbuilding is not on that list. Keeping the lights on and balancing the budget are but two examples of topics deservedly higher on the list of national priorities.
The good news is that the word ‘ports’ got two mentions during SONA, and few would argue that this was well-deserved. “To deal with severe inefficiencies in our freight logistics system, we are taking action to improve our ports and rail network and restore them to world-class standards,” the president promised about half way through his speech. And then, later on: “ We will see through the work underway with our partners to end load-shedding and revive the performance of our ports and rail network.”
Reviving port performance would have an immediate positive impact on the boatbuilding sector, and on exports generally.