• The department of trade and industry is launching a website in October to allow businesses to register electronically.
• It is being developed alongside the World Bank to reduce SA’s lengthy business registrations periods.
• The website will be expanded to include banking services, home affairs registrations and nonprofit registrations. 
• For more stories, go to Business Insider SA.

South African businesses will soon be able to register their businesses and complete all the relevant paperwork on one website, the department of trade and industry said.

Spokesperson Sidwell Medupe said the website, named Bizportal, will be launched in October in a bid to reduce South Africa’s lengthy business registration periods. 

According to the World Bank’s doing business report, it takes an average of 25 days to register a business in South Africa, compared to five in China, two in Mauritius, and only one in New Zealand and India. 

South Africans can already register businesses on the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC), but Medupe said the new website will include functions such as registering for the unemployment insurance fund (UIF), the compensation fund, and getting a tax number.

“It will be an easy, fast, and quick registration platform that fulfills several of the requirements for starting a business,” Medupe told Business Insider South Africa. 

He said the department is working with the World Bank to improve the efficiency and processing time of the system.

The South African government hopes that this will become the one portal for all business registrations in the country, Medupe said.

He said further expansion of the system is planned, including adding banking and credit applications, home affairs registrations, and nonprofit registrations to the platform.

“We see this as the start of South Africa’s e-government, Medupe said. “The possibilities of multiple services are endless.”