The following article by IMC’s US Country Manager Simon Barber appeared in the November 7, 2007, edition of the Mail and Guardian:

Priceless human capital has left South Africa. The Homecoming Revolution and skills-hungry employers are trying to get it back. Global South Africans, a complementary initiative by the International Marketing Council, is harnessing the capital where it now resides.

The GSA project is being piloted in the US. The aim is to build a worldwide network or “brain bank” of a thousand or so of the best and brightest minds in the South African diaspora and connect them to where they can make a difference back home.

Membership recruited in the US since April stands at 120. The recruits may not be coming home just yet, but they are very useful where they are. They have knowledge, deep rolodexes, the respect of their peers and the capacity to mobilize resources. Important people take their calls. They are willing to put those assets to work for a country to which they still feel strongly attached.

It is an impressive cast. Members include Pieter De Villiers, founder and president of Clickatell, the SMS messaging innovator; Stanley Bergman, CEO of Fortune 500 Henry Schein and Co., the largest distributor of health care products in the US; Bain Capital principal John Tudor, who drove Bain’s acquisition of Edgars; Khayapa Molapo, vice president , Merril Lynch Global Markets; and Lara Logan, CBS News chief foreign correspondent, widely hailed as the new Christiane Amanpour.

There is a strong business and finance orientation to the network, but, as Logan’s inclusion suggests, GSA is casting a wider net. We have members from the entertainment industry but would like more. A significant proportion of South Africans living in the US is in medicine and academe and this is already reflected in GSA’s membership.

Prof. Daniel Bradlow, for example, directs the International Legal Studies programme at American University in Washington. He is also developing a sophisticated debt instrument that will enable South Africans abroad to invest in job-creating projects in poor communities back home.

Dr. Michael Levy came to Washington in the mid 80’s from Wits Medical School, interned at DC General Hospital - the local equivalent of Chris Hani Baragwanath - and then went on to found one of the best-known in vitro fertilization clinics in the US.

Dr Levy has long been keen to give something back to South Africa. At one point he offered to arrange donations of used but still top of the line medical equipment to South African hospitals. His offer got lost in the bureaucracy. He is now interested in doing some pro bono teaching in South Africa - and recruiting colleagues from his very substantial database to do the same. GSA will help him make the right connections.

We expect the network to make an important contribution to skills development. Members will be given the opportunity to adopt schools, place South Africa students in US universities, offer internships in their companies, help graduates from disadvantaged backgrounds develop connections in the world of work, and give lectures and seminars when they are in South Africa.

The network can also play a significant role promoting South African entrepreneurs and innovators, spreading word of what South Africa has to offer, giving strategic advice and helping find partners and finance. We see members opening doors for trade missions, official and private sector. Some may be able to help South African exporters make fuller use of the African Growth and Opportunity Act. Others will be well placed to promote investment in South Africa.

The list of possible contributions is limitless, and it would be rash to dictate in advance what the network should produce. Networks are like brains whose neurons connect in unexpected ways to produce previously unimagined insights and ideas. What is important is that South Africans know that the resource is out there, waiting to be tapped.

We are still working on the interface between the network and whoever wants to access it. While the initiative will be web-enabled, it will not web-dependent like the South African Network of Skills Abroad, SANSANET , essentially a website where South Africans abroad could post their credentials and contact details on an online database. Now being revamped, SANSANET was moribund for some years. GSA, by contrast, will have human beings acting as intermediaries between the network and its customers.

Currently, those human beings are myself, IMC’s US country manager, and my colleague, Lee Gillespie-White, an attorney formerly with Bell, Dewar and Hall. My UK counterpart, John Battersby, ex-editor of the Sunday Independent, is about to start recruiting on his side of the Atlantic.

Why has IMC, whose job is to manage and promote the South African brand, got into the business of diaspora mobilization? The simple answer is that the diaspora has a major impact on how South Africa is perceived abroad by investors and others. The fact that successful and influential expatriates want to continue being a part of the South African story sets an important example and sends a positive signal.

The more expatriates feel part of Team South Africa, the better they will play for Team South Africa.