Secondly, over the same period, net purchases by non-residents of South African securities listed on the exchanges amounted to about R34 billion. Supportive fiscal policies The Minister of Finance applied further disciplines in his Budget proposals for 1997/98 with a commitment to reduce both government dissaving and the deficit before borrowing during the current fiscal year.
In the preceding year net dissaving by government was equal to 3.1 per cent, and the budget deficit equal to 5.6 per cent of gross domestic product. The deficit for the current fiscal year is expected to be reduced to 4.0 per cent of gross domestic product.