South Africa: Yes or No to Trade

         South Africa is the EU's largest trading partner in Africa and its exports to the EU are growing and the composition of those exports is becoming more diverse. South Africa is gradually moving from mainly commodity-based products to a more diversified export profile that includes manufactured products.

Trade in goods

• EU good exports to South Africa 2010: €21.507 million
• EU goods imports from South Africa 2010: €17.912 million

South Africa's primary exports to the EU are: fuels and mining products (27%), machinery and transport equipment (18%) and other semi-manufactured goods (16%). EU exports to South Africa are dominated by machinery & transport equipment (50%), chemicals (15%) and other semi-machinery (10%).

Trade in services

• EU services exports to South Africa 2009: €5.3 million
• EU services imports from South Africa 2009: €3.8 million

Foreign Direct Investment

• EU investment flows to South Africa 2009: €5.9 billion
• South Africa investment flows to EU 2009: €1.0 billion
• EU investment stocks in South Africa 2009: €70.8 billion
• South Africa investment stocks in EU 2009: €6.2 billion

Therefore, as it could be understood about the trade role in emerging economies such as South Africa, it is really essential for them to have free trade to be developed. However, as time goes by, they should find their position in the global market and try to take advantage of comparative advantage to produce more specialized products. Otherwise, they will be altered to just main importers which do not have any reliable domestic industry to improve its national economy and GDP.

Hence, it is strongly recommended for emerging countries to pay attention to their domestic industries and prevent them from failure in production. Otherwise, they would have to spend more time to think about job problems for employees who already have been laid off.