Contact us

National Empowerment Fund

The National Empowerment Fund (NEF) is the catalyst of Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment (B-BBEE) in South Africa. The NEF enables, promotes and implements innovative investment and transformation solutions, to advance sustainable black economic participation.

Strategic Role and Positioning

The NEF’s role is to support B-BBEE. As the debate around what constitutes meaningful and sustainable B-BBEE evolves, the NEF anticipates future funding and investment requirements to assist black entrepreneurs and communities achieve each element of the Codes of Good Practice. These include a focus on preferential procurement, broadening the reach of equity ownership, transformation in management and staff, while preventing the dilution of black shareholding.

The NEF differentiates itself not only with a focused mandate for B-BBEE, but by also assuming a predominantly equity-based risk to maximise the empowerment dividend. Reward should balance the risk, with the application of sound commercial decisions to support national priorities and government policy, such as the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative for South Africa (AsgiSA) or targeted investments through the dti’s National industrial Policy Framework (NIPF).

The work of the NEF therefore straddles and complements other development finance institutions (DFIs) by allowing the organisations to work in close collaboration with each other. Close co-operation with these institutions, and the sharing of its special sector expertise and knowledge, enables the NEF to add value to the work of other DFIs and further contribute to the realisation of their mandate.

Products and Services

Entrepreneurship Fund – The product aims to address the financing needs of black Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). The product supports both the creation of new black SMEs, as well as the provision of expansion capital to black businesses that are already empowered.

Procurement Finance – The product seeks to provide access to finance to black SMEs that have been able to exploit opportunities available as a result of preferential procurement initiation.

Franchise Finance – The Franchise fund is geared towards enabling black people to leverage the infrastructure available in the franchise industry, in order to gain access to economic opportunities.

Project Equity Finance – The product addresses the financing requirements of BEE parties seeking to participate in medium-sized green field’s project.

Rural and Community Development Programme (RCDP) – In accordance with the B-BBEE Act, the RCDP facilitates increasing the extent to which workers, co-operatives and other collective enterprises own and manage business enterprises. Also, it supports the B-BBEE Act objectives of empowering local and rural communities.

Acquisition Finance – The Acquisition Finance product supports black entrepreneurs seeking to acquire equity stakes in existing businesses. The product represents the NEF’s intervention in addressing the black equity ownership requirements of the BEE Codes of Good Practice.

Capital Market – The product is targeted at companies seeking to enlist on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) or the AltX markets. The product facilitates the participation of BEE groups, and in particular black women, in the equity ownership of targeted companies. The product also caters for expansion capital to listed BEE companies.