THE region's mission is to provide all its residents with access to good quality, affordable services, in a customer focused and responsive manner.

Its slogan is "Always striving for service excellence", which shows its intention to support fully the implementation of the City's programmes and projects.

Partly comprising Johannesburg's central areas, or the inner city, the region is the site of the original mining camps of the City of Gold, which were established towards the end of the 19th century.

Over time, the city spread out: its central business district became dense, with high-rise office and residential buildings and excellent infrastructure was developed. Some of the earliest residential, business and industrial areas that grew up around the centre of Johannesburg form part of Region F.

There was an exodus of business investment to decentralised nodes during the 1980s and 90s, resulting in degradation of the CBD and a spread of urban blight into some surrounding areas.

For all its problems, however, the region is blessed with some of Johannesburg's most important facilities and attractions, including the University of the Witwatersrand and world-class theatres.

It is also the hub of the city's transport network and is still home to a significant business population, especially in the banking sector.

Region F contains a collection of upper- and lower-income residential areas mixed with a number of older, heavier industrial nodes. From an industrial perspective there are limited new developments in these areas, but they are generally well located on the freeway system, with easy access to the M1, M2 and N1 highways.

The province's only inland container terminal is found at City Deep.

Though in the past there has been less retail development in the southern part of the region than in the active north of Johannesburg, this has changed drastically with the building of Southgate and The Glen Shopping Centre, among others.