cooperation initiatives, including the southern african development community ( sadc ) which has 14 member states. the sadc member states are : south africa, angola, botswana, lesotho, malawi, mauritius, mozambique, namibia, swaziland, tanzania, zambia, zimbabwe, the democratic republic of the congo and the seychelles. the forerunner of the sadc was a regional grouping of nine southern african states which started working together in 1980 with a view to reducing their economic dependence on the then apartheid ruled south africa. over time, more members joined and by the time south africa entered the fold after the democratic elections of 1994, the aim of the regional grouping was to work towards economic integration. whilst it is factually correct that south africa is the largest economy in our region, accounting for some 65 % of the region ’ s gross domestic product in dollar terms, we are, however, on a per capita basis, the third best off — behind mauritius and botswana. mauritius has a gdp per capita of more than $ 3, 500 while south africa ’ s is less than $ 3, 000. in the rich countries of the world, per capita incomes are about eight times as high as they are in this subregion of africa. as part of the process of promoting regional economic integration, each sadc member country was allocated an economic sector to coordinate, based on the country ’ s actual or potential capacity. south africa has been allocated responsibility for the coordination of the finance and investment sector of the sadc. the coordination of the sector is led by the minister of finance of south africa. the finance and investment sector was given to south africa in recognition of its developed financial markets and institutions. the committee of the sadc central bank governors which meets twice a year, forms part of the finance and investment sector and is chaired by the governor of the south african reserve bank. the committee of governors met for the first time in november 1995. its terms of reference focus, among other things, on closer cooperation among central banks in the sadc in the areas of monetary policy and policy instruments, bank supervision, money and capital markets, international financial relations, payment, clearing and settlement systems, training, and money laundering. information technology is one of the most important areas of cooperation. the concerns with properly functioning financial and banking systems naturally made year 2000 preparedness one of our priorities this year. more generally, it is crucial to note that financial and banking issues cannot be looked at in isolation, without reference to other sadc concerns

raise their share of output flowing to the export market. in the process, upcoming markets such as china and india are also receiving due attention. tourism is also doing well in spite of, and perhaps even because of, the unease following the september 11 attacks. south africa is a pleasant destination. the number of non - residents visiting south africa rose from 4, 8 million in the first 10 months of 2001 to 5, 3 million in the same period of 2002. visitor numbers from virtually all countries have increased significantly, with the exception of argentina - the worsening of the exchange rate in that instance caused a decrease from 13 000 persons in the ten months to october last year to 4 000 this year. under these circumstances, south africa maintained a healthy growth rate in the first three quarters of 2002. it seems likely that growth in real gross domestic product this year will amount to around 3 per cent, compared to 2, 8 per cent in 2001. it is also heartening that the growth is spread across virtually all sectors of the economy. a further gratifying aspect of the economy's current performance is the acceleration in real fixed capital formation, so necessary to boost the future production potential of the economy. from a contraction in 1999, real fixed capital formation reversed to 0, 8 per cent growth in 2000, 3, 6 per cent growth in 2001 and 7, 6 per cent year - on - year growth in the third quarter of 2002. once again, the acceleration is fairly widely spread over the various sectors of the economy. the accusation is often heard that south africa grows, but without creating jobs for the huge number of unemployed people. however, in the second quarter of 2002 our quarterly surveyed non - agricultural employment series picked up, rising by about 0, 6 per cent. this may be early days, but it stands in welcome contrast to the declining trend in such employment recorded since 1989. sadly, the 2001 fall in the external value of the rand caused a strong surge in inflation in 2002. this was first and foremost visible in production prices, which accelerated from a twelve - month rate of increase of 7, 8 per cent in september 2001 to double - digit rates right from january 2002, peaking at 15, 4 per cent in both august and september. in october it abated somewhat to 14, 6 per cent. consumer price inflation took longer to pick up. twelve - month cpix inflation accelerated from 5, 8 per cent in september 2001 to double - digit levels from august 2002, reaching 12