The ANC is considering establishing a State-owned pharmaceutical company, secretary general Gwede Mantashe said on Tuesday.

"Serious discussions started at the lekgotla on starting a State pharmaceutical company," he told reporters at Luthuli House in Johannesburg.

"It's not just an idea...[it has been] given back to Cabinet to say, 'look into the issue'... there was a compelling case for it," Mantashe said after a four-day ANC national executive committee lekgotla.

"Remember, a year ago, the establishment of a mining company was an idea. Today that mining company is operating a coal mine and is about to open a second coal mine. So it was an idea. Everything starts with an idea and it becomes reality when work is done on it.

"Brazil's state company is opening a branch in Mozambique. Now the question we are asking is why should we be a market for Brazil instead of being a market for ourselves?"

South Africa consumed 25% of antiretrovirals available in the world.

The lekgotla received a report on health, showing a dramatic increase in the number of people tested for HIV/Aids -- it had increased six-fold, from two million per annum to 12 million per annum.

There had also been a "dramatic increase" in the number of people accessing treatment.

The formation of a state-owned pharmaceutical company did not spell doom for the private sector, said Mantashe.

"... The fact that there is a pharmaceutical company, a state owned pharmaceutical company doesn't mean that the pharmaceutical industry will be closed down.

"There will still be a pharmaceutical industry, there will be a state company operating in the sector, there is a need for that. In the same way that we are establishing a mining company but not closing the mining sector."

The NEC lekgotla agreed to steam ahead with plans to create an office of the "Land Valuer General" and on the establishment of the Land Management Commission.

This would compliment processes around government's Green Paper on land reform, already unfolding.

"There is general buy-in into the concept," said Mantashe.

Organisations such as AgriSA, the Food and Allied Workers Union and the Transvaal Agricultural Union were all part of consultations.

"... it is talking to a number of issues; the focus: management of land distribution, number two, the proper valuation of land, rather than having an intermediary, which has an effect of bloating the price of land... that is the essence of what we are talking about when we talk about the land valuer general."

The lekgotla received reports on education, local government, rural development, infrastructure, health and monitoring and evaluation.

On the latter, Mantashe said the monitoring aspect was proceeding well, but more evaluation needed to be done.

"In terms of monitoring the work is quite clear and steaming ahead but evaluation, which means drilling deep into specific case studies and looking to the impact, we have not done well in that regard.

"That minister has been directed to actually dig deeper into that issue," he said.

Minister in the Presidency Collins Chabane is tasked with heading up government monitoring and evaluation.

The ANC decided to set up its own monitoring and evaluation unit, to be headed by NEC member and former spokeswoman, Jessie Duarte.

The government and the party would work "complimentary to each other".

"...they are going to compare notes. Monitoring and evaluation in the ANC will talk to monitoring and evaluation in the government," he said.

Decisions taken at the lekgotla would "inform the work of government" at a Cabinet lekgotla next week. It would also feed into Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan's medium-term budget to be tabled later this year.

The lekgotla also decided that the National Treasury and the health department would establish a national health insurance (NHI) seed grant by the years' end to aid the implementation of the insurance scheme.

The ANC's top brass, the alliance partners, ministers, deputy ministers and government director generals took part in the lekgotla.

Mantashe said the report on dodgy police lease deals by Public Protector, Thuli Madonsela, was not discussed at the four-day gathering.