Johannesburg, Apr 1 (PTI) Internationally-renowned South African, Indian-origin film magnate Anant Singh has received a special award from President Cyril Ramaphosa for generating over 100 billion rands in economic activity.
Ramaphosa presented Singh and his company Videovision Entertainment with the South Africa Investment Conference Business Award for developing Cape Town Film Studios, which has been the catalyst over the past 12 years for the Western Cape province of South Africa to benefit from the significant multiplier offered by the film industry.
These studios have enabled the generation of an estimated 7 billion rand per year in economic activity, with more than 100 billion rand being accrued to this region since the studios opened.
Singh’s award was made shortly after he participated in last week’s fourth annual SA Investment Conference, where major local and international corporates pledged 332 billion rand in investment to bring Ramaphosa’s target of raising 1.2 trillion rand over a five-year period to 95 per cent.
Participating in a session at the conference, Singh announced that he would also be developing a massive studio complex in Durban to the value of 7.5 billion rand, after the project had been stalled by a now-deceased property mogul who contested the purchase of a beachfront building that was previously owned by a military unit.
Ramaphosa referred to Singh as “one of our country’s great filmmakers and producers.” “I thank him for the commitment, that he and others in the creative industries are demonstrating to our country,” Ramaphosa said.
“Durban was an idea I initiated before Cape Town, but it was quite a challenge because of legal cases and now we will begin to build our film studios in Durban, which will be functional by the end of the year,” Singh told PTI afterwards.
“The investment in the lifestyle and entertainment centre is a phased investment that will total 7.5 billion rand over a seven-to-ten-year period, but the first phase of the film studio will be just over 200 million rand,” Singh added.
“South Africa has always had a very strong filmmaking community interest, which is continuing to grow bigger by the day, and is great for the industry and the country,” Singh said.
Singh also expressed the hope that the once very popular Bollywood film production locations in South Africa would start growing again, especially with the greater Durban region being home to more than half of the country’s 1.4 million citizens of Indian-origin.
During the panel discussion, Singh spoke passionately about the creative industries sharing content in Africa.
Whilst acknowledging the role streaming services are playing in content distribution, Singh warned that content creators should be wary about giving away their Intellectual Property to these organisations, which could retain ownership and control, without any future benefit for creators.
“We have amazing people on this continent. People do amazing things, but we do not celebrate that enough. Potential needs to be harnessed, supported and celebrated,” Singh said. PTI IND
This report is auto-generated from PTI news service. ThePrint holds no responsibility for its content.