THE SOUTH African Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan presented the #Budget2017 on the 22 February 2017 for both the upcoming year and the medium-term up to 2019/20. Arts & Culture fared resonably well in the budget, mainly in three areas: Basic education; arts, sports recreation and culture, and the arts and culture grant for community libraries.
Here is how arts and culture featured:
The basic education budget for 2017/18 of R226-billion includes arts, sports, recreation and culture.
"To promote a diverse and cohesive society with a common national identity, R32.5-billion is allocated over the medium term (3 years) period for arts and culture, and sport and recreation. This will support school sports, the indigenous games and sporting federations, and promote equity, redress and transformation in sports. The arts sector will focus on improving its Mzansi Golden Economy projects to create jobs, and improve heritage and performing arts infrastructure."
This amounts to an average of R10.5-bn per year for arts, sports, recreation and culture.
"The community library services grant, administered by the Department of Arts and Culture, aims to help South Africans access information to improve their socioeconomic situation. The grant is allocated to the relevant provincial department and administered by that department or through a service-level agreement with municipalities. In collaboration with provincial departments of basic education, the grant also funds libraries that serve both schools and the general public. Funds from this grant may also be used to shift the libraries function between provinces and municipalities. The baseline reduction on this grant in 2017/18 is R20.8-million. The grant is allocated R4.5-billion over the next three years."
This amounts to about R1.5-bn per year for the next three years.
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In addition to this there are a number of budgetary areas where creative industry practitioners and entrepreneurs can create leverage. For example, the R3.9-bn for SMMEs and Cooperatives; and the R4.2-bn into infrastructure for SEZs (start that creative SEZ now!), Finally, knowledge work will benefit from government's R1.9-bn investment into broadband implementation.
Watch the budget webcast here: http://www.treasury.gov.za/…/national%20b…/2017/webcast.aspx
DOWNLOAD THE FULL #BUDGET2017 HERE: http://www.treasury.gov.za/…/nationa…/2017/review/FullBR.pdf
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