Cape Town - The country's big food and clothing retailers, as well as the major banking groups, are among the main tenants at the R400 million Promenade shopping centre in Mitchells Plain, which opened its doors yesterday.

Anchor tenant Pick 'n Pay is joined by Woolworths, Game, Discom and clothing chains Edcon and Mr Price, among others, and fast food groups such as Nando's and Kentucky Fried Chicken. Major banks with branches in the centre include First National Bank and Standard Bank.

Ebrahim Rasool, the Western Cape's provincial minister of finance, said at the opening that the centre would not have been built without the support of the private sector. But at the same time, there was a need for more such development.

"To the private sector I say, there are many Mitchells Plains around the Western Cape," Rasool said.

"The challenge is to ensure that we take these types of developments to communities, not because it is a nice thing to do but because it makes business sense to invest in these areas."

Rasool echoed the words of Tasneem Essop, the MEC for public works and property management in the Western Cape. At the eighth African Congress of Shopping Centres earlier this month she called for more investment by the private sector in poorer communities  
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"You need to promote those areas that are marginalised and out of the developed areas. We need to bring the retail experience of poorer communities into the mainstream shopping experience."

Shamiel Kolbe, the chairman of the Mitchells Plain Industrial Development Trust, which together with Keystone Investments and a private investor was behind the development of the centre, said the key issue was to channel money back into the community.

Until now, Mitchells Plain residents had spent their money in other big malls, such as Kenilworth Centre, Canal Walk and Somerset West.

"Mitchells Plain has a monthly spending capacity of R100 million and 69 percent of that leaves the area," Kolbe said.

"If we can ensure that even 50 percent of that money is spent in the area, and indirectly ploughed back into the community, the shopping centre [will be] a success."

Wesgate is the other main shopping centre on the fringes of Mitchells Plain, but Kolbe said this had not been a success because of its inconvenient location, which was a remnant of apartheid.

The African Congress of Shopping Centres earlier this month was characterised by lively debate on the alleged poor treatment of small retailers in the country's major shopping malls.