When this Board was constituted in November 2005 the immediate challenge was to stabilise the NEF after its particularly challenging early years.

The primary objective was to put the NEF on a solid operational footing, to regain stakeholder and public trust, and to restore credibility for it to be in a sound position to deliver on its strategic goals. This involved a three-year process of redefining strategy, of reviewing and reconstituting infrastructure, systems, policies and procedures, and of ensuring that the right teams were in place to deliver on the NEF’s far-reaching mandate.

The hard work involved in doing that has paid off. The NEF has regained its stature, credibility and effectiveness and, having refined its definition of target audiences, is disbursing capital more effectively and efficiently than it had ever done before. This has been achieved largely through the development of improved planning and implementation processes, and also by instituting reliable methodologies for monitoring and evaluation. Just as important, both our stakeholder relationships and balance sheet are now on firm ground. Net asset value, for instance, has grown from just over R2.1 billion at the end of the 2006 financial year to R4.6 billion at the end of 2009.