City of Hope connects traders to opportunities to help grow economy

19 June 2023

More than 400 traders attended the City of Cape Town’s Economic Growth Directorate’s Informal Trading Economy and Expo held at the City Hall.

For the first time this year, the Informal Economy Summit featured an expo component, with 20 exhibitors ranging from small businesses to big corporates among others.

Key topics that were discussed included initiatives that are available to help support and grow the informal trading sector, the investment into infrastructure and digitisation of informal trading as well as informal economy food systems.

Feedback on the summit

Lucretia Splinters, CEO of the Mitchells Plain Entrepreneurs Hub, said it was an honour to represent a segment of her community in a sector that supports self-sustainability.

‘Knowledge share is extremely important as this is what people feel that we lack in our communities. Our Informal economies in our communities feed into the greater economy and if we can encourage our people to formalise and become compliant, then we can benefit with more support from our municipalities,’ said Splinters.

Jasmine Page, chairperson of YOUNG FUSION, 4th Avenue Mitchell's Plain, said this City summit was ‘by far the best one’. ‘The discussions were of utmost importance to the sector as this talked directly to the issues and challenges traders are facing on a daily basis. It was inspiring to see the passion and commitment of the City’s departments to find ways to improve the lives of the informal sector. The informal economy summit was truly a wonderful opportunity to connect with like-minded individuals and work towards creating a more equitable and just future for all. The efforts of the City of Cape Town towards this are commendable and signify a crucial step towards recognising and empowering the informal sector,’ said Page.

City initiatives to support local informal economy

Alderman James Vos, the City’s Mayoral Committee Member for Economic Growth, thanked the traders for attending this year’s summit and expo.

‘We appreciate your feedback and participation as it forms a vital role as we work together to grow this sector. The City has already put economic support systems in place for people across the metro – whether they’re job-seekers, traders or small business owners – that has helped hundreds of thousands of Capetonians to access opportunities. The City will continue to look at doing more as we build Cape Town as a City of Hope.

‘Overall, the City is open to experimenting with new approaches to markets and regulations by coming up with programmes to test new ideas in a variety of circumstances, adapting where necessary, and then adopting policies that work. As such, our Mobile Business Policy is currently open for comment and we really want your input on this. There’s so many other ways in which the City stands ready to assist traders in growing their enterprises,’ said Alderman Vos.

These are some of the available support programmes:

The Ease of Doing Business initiative. The City has launched an Index in which it will track 10 critical indicators of our business-facing services, with a special focus on enabling greater infrastructure investment and economic growth in Cape Town. The indicators include electricity and water connections, building plan approvals, and informal trading permits. This information is available on the online dashboard www.investcapetown.com
The City will continue to drive the reach of our skills development and workforce ready programmes.
Council approved close to R200 million in the 2023/24 budget for various programmes aimed at assisting all sectors and levels of the economy from work seekers, entrepreneurs, the informal economy, small businesses and high growth sectors.
The Directorate is planning to spend around R100 million on capital works on the City’s strategic economic assets and informal trading infrastructure. This means funding more capacity building, streamlining trader-facing services such as our e-permitting system, and growing a pipeline of infrastructure projects. Alderman Vos has visited various areas including Happy Valley in Blackheath, Kuils River, Dunoon, Mitchells Plain, and Ravensmead to see first-hand the infrastructure upgrades taking place. Other upgrades are under way in areas such as Mfuleni, Atlantis, and Masiphumelele.
Council again approved a zero percentage increase on Informal Trading Permits for the 2023/2024 financial year. This 0% tariff increase is a direct contribution by the City to create more jobs in the informal trading sector. This follows:

 A zero percentage increase on the permits for the current 2022/2023 financial year;

 A 12-month informal trading Permit Fee Amnesty for 2022; and

 The writing-off of informal trading permit Covid-19 related arrears for the period 1 April 2020 until 31 December 2021.

The My Cape Town Market series was expanded to communities across the metro to give entrepreneurs a place to trade and to connect them with a new market of consumers.
The Business Helpdesk offers a range of free workshops on topics including tendering, costing and pricing, and business improvement strategies.
New skills development courses are available such as monthly construction training workshops; Supplier Matters Day every Wednesday to assist prospective and existing City vendors with registration issues; and Business Information and Supplier Network sessions.
The Cape Town Entrepreneurship Academy, an online learning portal for aspiring and existing business owners, covers subjects or fields relating to the growth of a start-up or SMME and is supplied by experts and experienced business owners.

For more information about opportunities for traders, visit www.capetown.gov.za/businesshub or email business.support@capetown.gov.za or informal.trading@capetown.gov.za

Published by:
City of Cape Town, Media Office

Economic growth informal traders