The major manufacturing sectors include food processing and the production of textiles, metals, and chemicals. Agriculture and fisheries provide the basis for substantial activity in meat, fish, and fruit canning, sugar refining, and other processing, with more than half of these products being exported. A large and complex chemical industry has developed from early beginnings in the manufacture of explosives for use in mining.

Manufacturing encompasses automobiles, ships, building materials, electronics, and many other products, notably armaments. Though the weapons industry has begun to diversify into nonmilitary production, the postapartheid government has also promoted a controversial export trade in arms, after military sanctions were lifted. Manufacturing has depended heavily on foreign capital; it expanded rapidly in the 1960s and early ’70s but grew relatively slowly or even contracted during the ’80s. As mining gradually declines, manufacturing and its need for foreign capital take on even greater importance for national development.