Conference Speakers:

Tshediso Matona
Tshediso Matona was appointed Director-General of the Department of Trade and Industry from July 2006. His appointment follows 10 years of service in the department. He became Acting Director General of the DTI in April 2005 and served in that position until June 2006.

He was appointed Deputy Director-General of the International Trade and Economic Development division in 2002, a position that he held until his appointment as acting Director-General.

Before that, he held various managerial positions in the department, including that of trade negotiations from 1995-2002. He also served as a trade diplomat in the South African Mission to the UN and WTO in Geneva from 1996-1998. Prior to his career in the public service, Matona pursued an academic career at the University of Cape Town that included a stint as trade policy and politics researcher from 1987-1993.

Plenary Speakers:

Guillermo de la Dehesa
Guillermo de la Dehesa is the Chairman of the Centre for Economic Policy Research in London. He spent twenty years in various Spanish governmental positions from the late 1960s through the late 1980s. Since leaving the public sector he has held a number of Chairman and Chief Executive positions in the private sector; he is currently Vice Chairman of Goldman Sachs Europe, Independent Director of the Santander Banking Group and Aviva PLC, among others. He is a member of the "Group of Thirty", a nonprofit, independent consultative group which counts luminaries such as Mervyn King (Governor at the Bank of England), Lawrence Summers (President of Harvard), Paul Krugman and Stanley Fischer among its ranks.

Previously, he was the Governor of the Inter American Development Bank, Asian Development Bank and African Development Bank.

He is a Member of the Euro 50 Group, in Brussels and also Monetary Expert of the Economic and Monetary Committee of the European Parliament.

He has authored and co-authored around 40 books and has published more than 90 papers in various economic journals. Most recently, he has authored the books "Winners and Losers in Globalization" (2005) and "More and Better Globalization" (2006).

Tony Venables is Chief Economist at the UK Department for International Economics and Professor of International Economics at the London School of Economics, where he also directs the international trade research programme of the Centre for Economic Performance. He is a Fellow of the British Academy and of the Econometric Society. Previous experience includes work as research manager of the trade research group in the World Bank and as advisor to the UK Treasury.

He has published extensively in the areas of international trade and spatial economics, including work on trade and imperfect competition, economic integration, multinational firms, and economic geography. Publications include The spatial economy; cities, regions and international trade, with M. Fujita and P. Krugman (MIT press, 1999), and Multinationals in the World Economy with G. Barba Navaretti (Princeton 2004). 

Gala Dinner Speaker

Debating Challenges of a Higher Growth Trajectory
(Please click here to listen to the Speech)

Joel Khathutshelo Netshitenzhe, also known as Peter Mayibuye, was born on 21 December 1956 in Sibasa in the Northern (Limpopo) Province. He attended Mphephu High School and matriculated in 1974.

Between 1975 and 1976 he attended the University of Natal (Medical School) but suspended his studies in the second year when he left for exile to join the African National Congress. From 1982 to 1984 Mr. Netshitenzhe read for a diploma at the Institute of Social Sciences in Moscow. Between 1995 and 1996 he did a post-graduate diploma in Economic Principles with the University of London. In 1999 he completed a Master of Science degree in Financial Economics with the same institution.

Between 1976 and 1978 he received basic military training in Angola. Between 1978 and 1994 Mr. Netshitenzhe worked in various capacities within the African National Congress (ANC). He also worked as a radio journalist for Radio Freedom from 1978 and from1980 as a print journalist and as editor for Mayibuye - an ANC journal.

Between 1987 and 1990 Mr. Netshitenzhe was a member of the ANC Politico-Military Council. He also served as Deputy Head of the ANCs Department of Information and Publicity between 1987 and 1994. He was part of the ANC negotiating team at the Codesa talks from 1992 to 1994. Before joining the GCIS as Chief Executive Officer (1998 2006), he was Head of Communication in President Mandelas office (1994 1998). In addition to being CEO of GCIS, he was in 2001 appointed Head of the Policy Co-ordination and Advisory Services (PCAS) in The Presidency. In July 2006, Mr Netshitenzhe took up the position of Head of PCAS on a full-time basis.

Mr. Netshitenzhe is a Board Member of the Nelson Mandela Trust and CEEF.Africa Trust.