Employee Ownership in Southern Africa

Zimbabwe and South Africa are both actively pursuing employee ownership as a means of transferring ownership to traditionally marginalized groups. In early December, Zimbabwe's president Robert Mugabe launched the Schwepps Zimbabwe Limited employee ownership trust, which now owns 51% of the company on behalf of 700 employees. The government intends this transaction, the largest to date under the country's Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment Act, to serve as a model for future transactions. In South Africa, an ownership scheme matured, giving employees at Kumba Iron Ore an average payout of R576,045 (71,200 USD) per employee from a share ownership plan, described in a news video.