The Government Institutions Pension Fund (GIPF) has over the years invested over N.dollars 500 million, about five per cent of its total portfolio, in unlisted investments in the Erongo Region.
Etosha Fishing is one of the fund’s 16 unlisted investments in the region, which allows the fund to benefit directly.
The chairperson of GIPF’s Board of Trustees, Nillian Muleni revealed this information to the media during a familiarisation visit by the fund’s board of trustees to all of its investment projects in Walvis Bay in the Erongo Region, on Thursday.
“The reason why we select a few impact projects to invest in is that we want to invest in what is called the real economy. There is a direct benefit from all sectors of the economy. There is also a lot of research that takes place to domesticate some of the services that we offer as a country,” Muleni noted.
She however noted that although there is a direct benefit through unlisted investments, they are also naturally risky investments because they are not listed on any stock markets, so they do not have a track record of performance that one can use to assess their performance.
“We have put in measures to understand the risks involved in some of our investments, however some of the risks one cannot foresee such as Covid-19. Each sector was affected differently, but we had an effort to push ourselves against the risk to allow for investments to operate during the time when activity was poor and we are hoping that this will pay off with the lifting of the several Covid-19 restrictions,” Muleni said.
GIPF’s Chief Executive Officer David Nuyoma at the same event noted that although Etosha Fishing, in particular, has not been an easy investment for the fund since the moratorium on pilchard fishing in the country, the company has also ventured into canning other fish types such as horse mackerel.
“It has been quite a tenacious effort by Etosha Fishing and its management since pilchard is not readily available in Namibian waters anymore but through innovative approaches, they have been able to import pilchard from Morocco,” Nuyoma said.
The company did not shut down or lay off its employees since the outbreak of the pandemic.
Source: Namibia Press News Agency
