Chairperson, the President of the Republic, His Excellency J G Zuma, premiers and MECs, hon members of the NCOP, representatives from Salga and our guests from Nigeria, as the Limpopo province we are working to create a lasting establishment that is capable of improving the living standards of our people.
The provision of basic necessities forms the cornerstone of our priorities within the context of co-operative governance, as outlined by the theme of this gathering. We have set special priority projects for the next five years, which will assist in accelerating service provision to the people.
We wish to indicate that, as a province, we are on course in making our contribution to the commitment made by the President to create 500 000 job opportunities by the end of this financial year. Of that, we must make a contribution of 13%. We wish to indicate that, at the moment, we have already established over 16 000 jobs in that regard. We are guided to do this because of our understanding that our province is part of the integral system of the South African governance system.
We have, of course, identified major areas that can contribute towards job creation around mining and tourism. In this regard, we are promoting investment in tourism that can contribute towards job creation.
Limpopo is advantageously located between some of the SADC countries. We have an accord on tourism with Botswana, Mozambique and Zimbabwe in the north, and in the northeast we have an accord with the great Limpopo icon - the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park - which passes through Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Botswana. This initiative is a great opportunity for the province to expand in the field of tourism and parks.
With regard to the strengthening of our skills and resource base, we have come to the conclusion that there is a need to establish technical schools in the province. These schools will ensure that people are given life skills that will assist them to respond to the challenges we are faced with today.
We have just returned from the Provincial Growth and Development Strategy Summit, to assess the impact of the global economic meltdown on our growth and to discover new frontiers in the battle for a better life for all. The summit resolved to build an economy that is inclusive and able to concretely better the living conditions of our people.
We are currently increasing the number of clinics providing a 24-hour service from 74% to 86%. Antiretroviral treatment sites increased from 47 in the 2007-08 financial year to 64 in the 2008-09 financial year.
The number of patients receiving ARVs was standing at 43 000 as of March this year. We have witnessed an encouraging decline in HIV infections amongst women attending antenatal clinics at public institutions. As a province, we are not immune to the challenges of a shortage in qualified health care officials and of medicine in certain instances.
We are also engaged with the hospital revitalisation programme, where we have concluded construction of two hospitals and are currently refurbishing eight of the identified hospitals. We have completed the building of 20 clinics and are planning to build 14 more.
We wish to indicate that we appreciate the fact that the President has declared one of our areas, Muyexe, as a pilot project for rural development. However, we wish to indicate to the House that the issue of rural development is not just starting now with Muyexe. We had a project in Ga-Kgatla village in Blouberg Municipality, where we turned the situation around in terms of ensuring that this community in the remotest part of the province, that did not have water and electricity, today, as we speak, has water and electricity.
In terms of the provision of electricity to households, we are currently standing at 78% and our aim is to increase the provision of basic necessities to our people, because we understand very well that the provision of electricity and water is central to the development of our own communities.
Agriculture is the third largest employer in the province, accounting for 11% of the labour force. Unfortunately, this sector is at risk of being on a downward trend due to the recession, the shortage of water and the impediment caused by unresolved land claims in the province.
The issue of food security is directly connected to agriculture. In order to boost food security, we will be extending our support to farmers through, among other things, irrigation infrastructure development. Already, 216 farmers are benefiting from the programme for the Revitalisation of Smallholder Irrigation Schemes, Resis, and the number will be increased to cover 423 farmers.
In partnership with the private sector, much attention is devoted to the agenda of stimulating our rural towns. We are relocating and busy building most of our district municipal offices and departmental district offices in these towns. We wish to indicate that we will be relocating the district offices of Sekhukhune to Jane Furse. The plans in this regard are at an advanced stage and we believe this will contribute towards developing those communities round Jane Furse.
Although Limpopo is rated as one of the safest provinces in the country, efforts to fight crime and corruption are not relaxed. We are doing everything in our power to ensure that our communities are free from any form of criminal activity.
It is clear that we cannot tolerate corruption or maladministration. We are proud to report that 8 of our 11 departments managed to receive unqualified audit reports in the 2008-09 audit opinion given by the Auditor-General. We are working at capacitating our municipalities to enable them to acquire clean audit reports by 2014.
This brief picture represents the state of affairs in the province. It is important to note that our efforts to improve the living conditions of the people can neither be deferred nor delayed. Together, we can do more. Thank you. [Applause.]