The George Economic Development department on Wednesday 6th March, launched the #InvestGeorge initiative at Fancourt Hotel and Conference Centre, announcing to investors and local business stakeholders alike that George is serious about attracting investment into the city and growing the economy.
“George has huge potential to become a “want to” invest destination. Council has taken the decision in the upcoming financial year to boost infrastructure to further facilitate investment,” said George Executive Mayor Melvin Naik in his official welcome.
Pedro Oliphant, Manager Economic Development said of George, “Our unique strengths as a city include our strategic location, access to industrial and urban markets, a progressive labour force, passionate community partners, reliable infrastructure, favourable real estate values and pro-business positioning. The City also boasts top quality trails, parks, recreation and sporting facilities, including flawless fusion of leisure and world-class golfing that businesses value for their employees.”
“The economic development division has already done the groundwork on developing this brand essence with partners and has formulated some elements of the credible economic narrative that amplifies our unique economic offering to domestic and global investors. This is something the department wants to test and refine with our stakeholders noting that George as a city has a certain role to play in driving economic growth in the Southern cape, primarily through providing stable governance, delivery of infrastructure, and interventions aimed at addressing red tape at local level and improving the ease of doing business through process optimization.
To build on and leverage this groundwork, the municipality has signed a 3 Year Service Level Agreement with Wesgro`s Tourism Trade and Investment Agency which is supporting the municipality through direct engagements, company site visits to support growth of local business on an ongoing basis and is working closely with the City to strengthen municipal structures for inbound investors and local businesses.
Within the next few months the George Investment team collaboration with Wesgro will be undertaking a investment awareness marketing campaign to promote the #InvestGeorge initiative developed, across 6 key markets including, Johannesburg; Cape Town; UK; Germany; Netherlands and China with active monitoring of the investment leads stemming from the campaign.
“We are pleased that George has joined Wesgro as an official partner, there is an extraordinary story at a business level to be told here. Landing investments to assist with boosting exports, as well as expanding air connectivity for George Airport will be a key focus for Wesgro. We look forward to working collaboratively with the George Municipality and local businesses to promote the destination,” said Wesgro CEO, Tim Harris.
