Marlow De Mardt Laurance Mitchell Francisca Nadia Sujee

The Cape Film Commission (CFC) is the official representative of the City of Cape Town and the Provincial Government of the Western Cape, with the objective of positioning both the City and the Province as a globally competitive film region, thereby boosting tourism, job creation and the development of core skills.

It is on this economic development premise that the Cape Film Commission in collaboration with the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) hosted a presentation and networking function for the film industry. The aim of the session was to present the recently launched South African Film and Television Rebate incentive schemes to the film industry in Cape Town.

The new film and television production incentives comprises of the Location Film and Television Production Scheme, and the South African Film and Television Production and Co-Production Scheme.

These revised film production incentives intend to increase local content generation and improve location competitiveness for foreign film productions in South Africa.

Firstly, The Location Film and Television Production scheme will be available to foreign-owned productions with Qualifying South African Production Expenditure (QSAPE) of R12 million and above. It provides a rebate of 15 per cent of the QSAPE to qualifying productions in the following formats: feature films, telemovies, television drama series, documentaries, animation and short form animations. Its aim is to attract large-budget overseas film and television productions to South Africa.

Secondly, The South African Film and Television Production Incentive is being introduced in order to provide more financial support for locally-owned productions and co-productions.

This incentive is available to both South African productions and official treaty co-productions with a total production budget of R2, 5 million and above. It provides a rebate of 35 per cent for the first R6 million, and 25% for the remainder of the qualifying production expenditure. The following formats are eligible: feature films, telemovies, television drama series, documentaries, and animation and short form animations.

The value of the rebate for any qualifying production is capped at a maximum of R10 million.

The provisions of the incentives will encourage production companies to advance industry transformation through adherence to the requirements of Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment.

Moreover, the incentive is structured in such a way that it will provide necessary impetus to the growth of the South African film and television production industry thus creating an environment conducive for South African producers to attract investment and develop stable output and sustainable production companies.

All productions approved in terms of the Large Budget Film and Television Production Rebate would still be treated under the rules of that scheme, and will not be able to convert to the new incentive.

In addition to the financial support provided through the new rebate incentives, a number of other measures are being implemented as part of the broader sector development strategy. These include capacity development for emerging production companies, the development of writers and editors through the enterprise development programme and the establishment of five pilot programmes in different locations to address distribution infrastructure, local content and audience expansion.