The Democratic Alliance's major concern during the present economic crisis was job losses, the party's leader Helen Zille said on Thursday.

She was speaking at the DA's economic summit in Johannesburg.

"In the third quarter of last year 74,000 jobs were lost in South Africa - and every wage earner provides for up to ten dependants - so this is very significant," Zille said.

"Our aim is to create opportunities for all - because opportunities will contain poverty," Zille added.

She said that the ruling ANC's "lurch to the left" would throw SA off course and would "increase the fall-out from the current economic crisis".

According to the DA leader, the party had convened Thursday's economic summit to discuss SA's response to the global economic crisis and its local impact.

"South Africa needs clear leadership on how we should respond to this crisis," she said.

"Trevor Manuel has said there will be no change to SA's macro economic policy but the Congress of SA Trade Unions and the SA Communist Party are saying otherwise."

Zille said that the ANC's election manifesto recommended "all sorts of things".

"We cannot afford confusion at this time - if we have confusion we'll be punished by the markets," she said.

According to the DA leader, there were several reasons why SA had been spared the worst effects of the global financial and economic crisis.

"SA banks have played it relatively safely, they are well regulated --and few had direct involvement in the US market."

Zille also praised the National Credit Act and said that had the US had a similar act, this may have prevented it from falling into its present economic position.

The DA leader lauded South Africa's system of exchange controls, introduced during apartheid to avoid capital flight, saying they had "shielded our banks by trapping liquidity that may otherwise have been exposed offshore".

Turning to the property market, Zille said it was relatively strong and that there was "little danger" of it collapsing like the US real estate industry.

"Whatever current weaknesses there are in the local property market are more cyclical than structural.

"Higher interest rates, together with the boom in house prices over the last few years, were already taking a toll on the property market before the financial crisis hit."