How the world sees us

When one talks about investments it is always fun to get another view, be that an outsider, or someone with a different way of thinking to you. We always have a good chuckle when Mark Mobius comes on the box and we launch generic statements like: "Invest in emerging markets to capture higher growth rates and an expanding middle class". Or even better, we ask one way questions (no matter how hard you shout at the TV, nobody ever looks back, remember that when you watch sport, OK, no matter how hard you clap, they don't listen) like, hey Mark, what do you think about Brazil? And then of course we shoot back the Mobius answer: "Brazil....yes, lots of natural resources, a large growing population starting off a low base, high employment, politically stable, yes, I like Brazil". Something like that, Byron says I gave away too much. Byron then said, why don't you go to his twitter stream - Mark Mobius and find a good one, we liked this one:

"Urbanization could influence the demand and prices of commodities."

How useful and insightful. Hey, I love Mobius, we are just kidding around here. But this is a lead into a story that Byron picked up on in the Economist: Long walk to innovation - South Africa has been slow to innovate. That may be changing. That decades behind part does not exactly fill me with a great deal of excitement. What do you think about the economic path we are on? It is too easy to say as middle to upper class South Africans that we should be a low wage labour intensive industrial economy, which could solve unemployment. Very easy for middle to upper class South Africans to say. What would you do, if tasked to tackle unemployment, and how long do you think it will take? Email me your suggestions.