Chapter four: Economic governance and management 348. The government strategy for developing the sector includes measures to facilitate access to credit, promoting agricultural enterprises with greater value, reorientating extension services, technical and market research, promoting training-of-trainers programmes, market development and irrigation support. There is also a programme to address livestock theft by identifying stock owners, creating inventories, assigning brands and earmarks, and developing an effective animal movement monitoring and surveillance system. 349. Mining. The mining sector has grown rapidly over the last few years because of the expansion of the diamond industry. The sector’s contribution to GDP has increased from 0.2 per cent in 2003 to 6.5 per cent in 2006. Nonetheless, the sector’s contribution to employment creation is still limited. 350. Tourism. Tourism has long been touted as a potential growth sector in the economy, but this has not materialised so far. The main justification for its inclusion in the growth strategy is that it is labour intensive and therefore has the potential for raising income and reducing poverty. Data on tourism is sketchy and at best indicative. But if it is measured by hotels and restaurants, its contribution has been hovering around 2 per cent of GDP since 2003, but some estimates put its contribution to GDP at about 4.7 per cent. Although this contribution is small, there is scope for improvement, particularly if the Tourism Master Plan is successfully implemented. 351. Private sector development. The private sector is generally accepted as the largest potential engine of growth for Lesotho. However, it is relatively underdeveloped at the moment. Part of the problem is the stiff competition presented by South Africa for the location of industries and the destination of FDI. Thus any attempt to reposition the sector must emphasise exploiting Lesotho’s competitive advantage vis-à-vis South Africa. The advantages include the higher literacy rate, the relatively better labour relations, which mean fewer strikes, and government policies which offer stability. In addition, there are social and sporting facilities and the country is close to South Africa. These mean that an industrialist can theoretically locate his plant in Lesotho and enjoy its positional advantages without having to travel long distances in order to fulfil family and other obligations. 352. The private sector, like the rest of the economy, has been directly affected by the global financial crisis and recession, particularly because of reduced demand for textile exports to the USA. The challenge for the government is to develop a policy that would protect those jobs in the textile industry that could be lost as a result of the meltdown. The response of the government has been to provide financial resources (M30 million) to the Lesotho National Development Corporation (LNDC) to enable it to provide financial support for China Garment Manufacturing (CGM), the biggest employer of labour, in order to preserve the jobs that could be lost because of the global economic downturn. 353. Several government departments are also involved in various initiatives designed to promote the private sector. The Ministry of Trade and Industry, Cooperatives and Marketing (MTICM) has developed the One-Stop Shop (OSS). Its aim is to create a more conducive environment for private sector development by, for example, cutting the red tape involved in setting up businesses. At present, there is only one such shop, but the plan is to establish more. There is a plan, for example, to establish one for dealing with vehicle registrations. Its aim will be to assemble all the 101