News in South Africa 12th February: 1. Budget Speech incoming: Budget Speech season is here and based on Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana’s mid-term presentation, we can expect many complex challenges to be unpacked. Godongwana has projected that the government will miss its revenue targets by nearly R57 billion for the 2023/24 tax year, and then […]
News in South Africa 9th January: 1. Challenging year ahead: Some economists are predicting a challenging economic environment for South Africa in 2024 as domestic and global headwinds persist. The early-year forecasts comes amid an unresolved energy crisis, bottlenecks in the logistics sector and the pending general elections. The deteriorating state of the country’s public […]
News in South Africa 19th December: 1. Severe water shortages: Minister of Water and Sanitation, Senzo Mchunu, has pleaded with residents of Gauteng to reduce their water consumption as the water supply remains vulnerable to disruptions and may not be able to meet demand, resulting in shortages. Johannesburg and its surrounds have been hit by […]
News in South Africa 27th September: 1. Government to fail on its promises: South Africa is set to miss all but one of the 2030 development targets its National Planning Commission set just over a decade ago. Of nine targets set in the National Development Plan, ranging from employment to investment, five measures have deteriorated […]
News in South Africa 11th April: 1. Eskom debt relief extends to municipalities: National Treasury is rolling out an ambitious plan to rid struggling municipalities of their ever-growing debt to Eskom, but only if they adhere to strict conditions to permanently change problematic behaviour at council and consumer level. If successful, the plan – set […]
News in South Africa 15th February: 1. Inquiry into food prices launched: The Department of Trade and Industry and Competition has gazetted the terms of reference for a wide-reaching market inquiry related to the fresh produce market in South Africa, including prices. The inquiry, conducted by the Competition Commission, will investigate market conditions all along […]
News in South Africa 14th February: 1. Rand crashes through R18/$: The rand is trading on the wrong side of R18/$ for the first time in more than three months, as expectations grow that US interest rates may still climb much higher. On Monday morning, the local currency declined to R18.06/$, after trading around R17.50 […]
News in South Africa 21st December: 1. Minimum wage changes: Early in 2023, South Africa could have a new medium-term target for what the minimum wage should be. But it will not be a rand amount. Instead it will be a statement of intent – and a guarantee that minimum-wage earners will never fall behind […]
News in South Africa 12th December: 1. Stage 7 load shedding already here: As power utility Eskom spent much of last week avoiding the dreaded stage 7 load shedding threshold, economists at the Bureau for Economic Research (BER) said it has already technically been crossed. “At a point last week, Eskom was technically ‘shedding’ at […]
News in South Africa 6th December: 1. Politics draining rand: The South African rand clawed back some of its losses since the release of the explosive section 89 report on president Cyril Ramaphosa’s Phala Phala farm last week, but it remains in shaky space as political uncertainty persists. The rand recovered to around R17.19 a […]
