detailed sectoral reviews undertaken by the world economic forum. a case can be made that botswana ’ s policy tools have become either blunt or outdated or both, compared to those of other countries in its league. for an open economy such as that of botswana, benchmarking performance against peer countries is an unavoidable imperative. indeed it must be recognised that increased dynamism of many of these peer countries risks leaving botswana behind as it may not be easy to catch up. it is, therefore, encouraging that several initiatives are in place to improve the country ’ s competitiveness going forward. the implementation of the competition law that was passed in 2009 and the formation of the competition commission will discourage complacency in the private sector. there are also complementary efforts of the human resource development council and the labour market observatory in improving labour skills. for its part, the bank of botswana is reviewing a recent study which proposed further reforms to enhance the efficiency and broaden activities of the financial sector. it is also hoped that the more open and consultative approach, such as that of “ pitso ” will result in improvements to respective policies. these developments provide cautious grounds for optimism. but more remains to be done, and this may require the government to take tough decisions in order to make botswana genuinely business - friendly. the global competitiveness report also contains a ranking of factors that businesses in each country perceive as most problematic. i have yet to see what this year ’ s report has to say on this, but i do not expect any surprises. there is also the question of attitudes, which i have deliberately left unexplored. what i know is that for the last four years at least, the most common concern among botswana businesses was “ poor work ethic in the national labour force ”, closely followed, in some cases, by “ an inadequately educated workforce ”. so it is not hard to see where the main problems lie. but this is not just a matter that affects workers, the education system and policymakers ; it is as much a responsibility of supervisors, managers and, ultimately, chief executive officers and corporate boards, to accept that there is a problem, and then set out to redress it. you will readily agree that government policy can only do so much in such crucial areas. more broadly, i wish to add that a lingering culture of entitlement among businesses, and to some extent individuals too, can further undermine progress. surely, we can all earn our keep.

in funding public infrastructure was clearly appropriate. but now, with relatively low returns on such investments, the holding of financial reserves as a sustainable source of income for both current and future generations is increasingly important. the financial sector, too, has expanded rapidly, both in size and the range of services. in 2016, the financial and business services sector accounted for 13. 6 percent of gdp, dwarfing most other non - mining private sector activity ; for example, manufacturing accounted for only 5. 2 percent. over the past ten years, cumulative growth of the financial sector, in real terms, has been almost exactly 100 percent, compared to 52 percent for the economy as a whole. a major driving force in this development has been the rapid growth of the domestic pension fund industry. in the early 2000s, the government took a decision to effectively privatise a large portion of the foreign exchange reserves through the establishment of a defined contribution pension fund scheme for the public service. despite its openness, the impact of the global financial crisis on the botswana economy was relatively mild. the main negative shock was to the mining sector, but the transmission to the rest of the economy was muted, helped by government drawing on its financial savings to maintain public spending. for the financial sector, the predominantly " plain vanilla " characteristics and limited international linkages provided a shield against the worst effects, buttressed further by effective regulation and prudential supervision. there is no room for complacency, however, as the interconnectedness of africa with global financial markets continues to develop, encouraged by the search for yield and ample market liquidity resulting from an extended period of ultra - loose monetary policy. more generally, for the " africa rising " narrative to regain the much - needed momentum requires sustained recovery in global commodities markets. at the same time, increasingly stringent global regulatory requirements, especially on market conduct and financial crimes, notably the anti - money laundering and combatting of the financing of terrorism regimes, have created challenges. in this regard, a number of countries in the region have been subjected to enhanced due diligence by correspondent banks and, in general, negative perceptions among counterparties towards doing business with african banks. in response to the latter, it is clearly necessary for countries to do everything in their power to ensure that the know your customer, and the anti - money laundering and combatting of the financing of terrorism regulations in their jurisdictions are of the highest possible standards. adoption and effective implementation of such standards is also supportive