There are certain things that have to be imported, but most things can be sourced from local manufacturers or suppliers. By supporting local industry, one is preserving local jobs as well as the skills to keep that industry going. Once we lose those skills we will never get it back. The problem with local industry is that we do not have the required volumes to be really competitive. If we all support local industries, it may eventually happen. Manufacturers should also look at their quality and aim to export as that will give them critical mass to be truly competitive.
Quality should be a much higher consideration as it will be cheaper in the long run. Cheap, low quality imports are devastating to any economy as it destroys all the economic principles. The poor people suffer most as they cannot afford the better quality and then opt for a cheaper alternative which does not last and has to be replaced soon. So they end up paying over and over to replace the same thing. As they say in Afrikaans "goedkoop is duur koop".
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