ELLA Summit on Informality and Inclusive Growth: Johannesburg, 4&5 Oct 2016
As part of the ELLA programme, the Learning Alliance on Informality and Inclusive Growth organised a summit in South Africa, offering an opportunity to learn first-hand from experiences in Latin America. The summit was held in Johannesburg on the 4th and 5th of October 2016.
The key objective of the summit was to offer participants the opportunity to learn first-hand about the African and Latin American experience in terms of policies around informality and the impact of informality on inclusive growth. By discussing results obtained from research on South Africa and Colombia, we expected participants to generate useful lessons that can be translated into action in their own contexts.
Participants heard from a number of South African and Colombian researchers and experts. South African presenters included Prof. Haroon Bhorat, Morné Oosthuizen and Kezia Lilenstein. The Colombian and Latin American experience and insights were presented by Leonardo Villar, Cristina Fernandez and Guillermo Perry. Attendees also included African participants from the Online Learning Alliance who are also working in this area.
Summit objectives
This summit focused on discussing optimal policy design for managing informal markets, using experiences from South Africa and Latin America, and how these experiences might be applied to other labour markets.
Summit Documents
Presentations/slide decks:
- Informality and Inclusive Growth: An Introduction by Morne Oosthuizen
- Rethinking the Effect of Informality on Inclusive Growth: Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa, by Kezia Lilenstein
- Comments on "Rethinking The Effect Of Informality On Inclusive Growth", by Guillermo Perry
- Identifying the Types of Informality in Colombia and South Africa by Leonardo Villar
- Informal Entrepreneurship and Gauteng by Sally Peberdy
- Informality: Exit and Exclusion by Guillermo Perry
- Payroll Taxes and their Impact on Informality by Cristina Fernandez & Leonardo Villar
- Conceptualizing the Informal Economy: Evolution, Myths and Realities, by Imraan Valodia
- Informality in Latin America: Taxes and beyond by Angel Melguizo
- Comments on Rethinking the Effect of informality on Inclusive Growth: Lessons from Colombia and South Africa by Angel Melguizo
- The township (informal) economy: An area level perspective by Andrew Charman
Photographs from the summit are now online.
From left: Andrew Charman, Sally Peberdy, Cristina Fernandez, the ELLA research teams: Kezia Lilenstein (DPRU), Cristina Fernandez (Fedesarrollo), Morne Oosthuizen (DPRU), Aalia Cassim (former DPRU), Leonardo Villar (Fedesarrollo).
