South Africa is the economic powerhouse of Africa and forms part of the BRICS group of countries with Brazil, Russia, India and China. It has a favourable demographic profile and its rapidly expanding middle class has growing spending power. South Africa has a wealth of natural resources (including coal, platinum, coal, gold, iron ore, manganese nickel, uranium and chromium) and it enjoyes increased attention from international exploration companies, particularly in the oil and gas sector. It has world-class infrastructure, exciting innovation, research and development capabilities and an established manufacturing base. It is at the forefront of the development and rollout of new green technologies and industries, creating new and sustainable jobs in the process and reducing environmental impact. South Africa has sophisticated financial, legal and telecommunications sectors, and a number of global business process outsourcing (BPO) operations are located in the country. It has political and macro-economic stability, an abundant supply of semiskilled and unskilled labour, and it compares favourably to other emerging markets in terms of the overall cost of doing business. For professional jobs, labour costs are less than half of the cost of European countries. For manufacturing jobs, labour costs are around one-third cost of Europe. The South African Government has introduced wide-ranging legislation to promote training and skills development and fast-track the building of world-class skills and competences. One of the main reasons for South Africa becoming one of the most popular trade and investment destinations in the world is due to the country ensuring that it can meet specific trade and investment requirements of prospective investors.