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“If we change the ownership in the economy, but the economy is still the same size, we have achieved only one level of success, but have not succeeded in what we want to do with the economy.” – Gill Marcus, Reserve Bank governor

In pursuing broad-based BEE in South Africa, the government’s stated objectives are to facilitate the empowerment of blacks by:

•promoting economic transformation in order to enable meaningful participation of black people in the economy;

•achieving a substantial change in the racial composition of ownership and management structures and in the skilled occupations of existing and new businesses;

•increasing the extent to which communities, workers, co-operatives and other collective businesses own and manage existing and new businesses and increasing their access to economic activities, infrastructure and skills training;

•increasing the extent to which black women own and manage existing and new businesses, and increasing their access to economic activities, infrastructure and skills training; promoting investment programmes that lead to broad-based and meaningful participation in the economy by black people in order to achieve sustainable development and general prosperity;

•empowering rural and local communities by enabling them to gain access to economic activities, land, infrastructure, ownership and skills, and promoting access to finance for black economic empowerment.

The reason for the broad-based approach has been the perceived failure of economic transformation due to the problem that many role-players, including the government, have viewed broad-based BEE from the narrow ownership perspective. That is why the Broad-based Codes of Good Practice of 2007 were introduced. These 2007 Codes ensured that it would not be sufficient just to have black ownership as a BEE strategy. Seven years later there has been a significant change in direction. The Amended Codes are skewed - weighted towards black ownership once again.

BEE-driven transformation should be broad-based and entailing the genuine involvement of all stakeholders; led in particular by the incumbent business owners and managers.