Hey guys, A thread in which to discuss and post news & developments about the SA economy in general.



Commercial property 'booming'
09/01/2006 18:03 PM
By: Lynn Bolin

SA growth plan has 'potential'
20/01/2006 16:06 PM

SA spending party has R873bn price tag


CASH expenditure by South African households totalled about R873bn last year, with just more than a fifth of the amount spent on food, an independent survey showed yesterday.



The survey’s findings confirm previous studies which have shown rapid growth of the middle class — mostly made up of previously disadvantaged blacks — and a widening gap between the rich and poor.



“It shows that there is a movement to the middle class from the lower groups, but there is still a lot to be done about that,” said Johan Martin, who compiled the survey.

“There are still a lot of very poor people in the country. Seven percent of the population have less than R7000 a year in the household budget,” he said.

The living standards survey, conducted by Unisa’s Bureau of Market Research, said the amount excluded social grants and goods and services received in the form of donations.








The country’s population is estimated at 46,9-million people.

Africa’s largest economy is enjoying its longest expansion on record, but the benefits are yet to filter to the poor majority.

SA’s unemployment rate is estimated at 26,5%.

The survey by Unisa found that about 8% of the country’s 12,4-million households were very poor, accounting for less than 1% of the total household expenditure.

About 7% of households were classified as rich, responsible for 31% of household expenditure.

The middle class, which constituted 1,8-million households was responsible for R125,6bn of total expenditure.


Poor households spent 71% of their budget on food compared to 24% and 28% by their middle class and rich counterparts respectively, the survey showed.


South Africans spent R11bn on holidays last year, with the rich households responsible for 61% of that amount and another 53% for the R10,9bn splashed out on recreation, entertainment and sport, it said.

Rich households also accounted for 53% of the R10,9bn paid to domestic workers during that period. “They were also responsible for more than a third of total household expenditure on transport, medical and dental costs, insurance and funds, income tax and savings,” the report said.

SA’s affluent minority are predominantly white, but they have been joined by a growing group of blacks since the end of apartheid in 1994. With Reuters

South Africa is growing in Cell Phone market.

yeh they think there are now 21 million cellphone users in SA...one of the top 15 in the world

R372bn boost for growth plan
03/02/2006



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Asgisa to be 'closely tracked'
06/02/2006

Eskom scores R84bn from govt
06/02/2006

Cape Town -

Due to its booming economy and the shortage of skills, South African legislation will be relaxed to make it easier for foreigners to work in South Africa.
Will keep you posted...

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SA to open doors to foreigners
07/02/2006

SA 'can't fault with tourism'
07/02/2006

Budget promises fast growth
15/02/2006 16:07 PM

it was a good budget...good for first time property buyers!!! No transfer cost for property costing less than R500k

ECONOMY
Latest GDP data disappoints

Tue, 28 Feb 2006
South Africa's real GDP at market prices on a quarter-on-quarter seasonally annualised and adjusted basis rose by 3.3 percent in the fourth quarter of 2005 from 4.2 percent in the third quarter, Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) said.

This brought the annual average real growth for 2005 to 4.9 percent compared with 4.5 percent in 2004.

Slowest growth for 2005

The fourth quarter quarter-on-quarter seasonally annualised and adjusted growth rate was the slowest growth quarter in 2005 and followed increases of 4.6 percent in the first quarter and 5.4 percent in the second quarter.

The median forecast for the fourth quarter was 4 percent quarter-on-quarter seasonally annualised and adjusted with a range of 3.5 percent to 5 percent. The median forecast for 2005 was 5 percent, which is the government's forecast given in the February 15 Budget. The forecast range was from 4.8 percent to 5.2 percent.

The seasonally adjusted real value added at basic prices for all industries — which is equal to GDP minus taxes on products plus subsidies on products — increased by annualised rates of 4.7 percent, 5.1 percent, 4.3 percent and 3.4 percent during the first, second, third and fourth quarters of 2005 compared with the fourth quarter of 2004 and the first, second and third quarters of 2005 respectively.

Motor trade boosts bottom line

The unadjusted real GDP at market prices increased by 5.5 percent, 4.9 percent, 4.9 percent and 4.5 percent during the first, second, third and fourth quarters of 2005 compared with the respective quarters in 2004.

The 3.3 percent quarter-on-quarter seasonally adjusted and annualised increase in the fourth quarter was mainly due to increases in the real value added by the wholesale, retail and motor trade, hotels and restaurants industry (1.2 of a percentage point); the finance, real estate and business services industry (0.7 of a percentage point); transport, storage and communication industry (0.6 of a percentage point) and the construction industry (0.3 of a percentage point).

Economists disappointed

Here are economists' reactions to the release of fourth quarter GDP data.

Johan Rossouw, chief economist at Vector Securities:

"The figure is more or less in line with my expectations but below market consensus. I had expected the quarter to be fairly weak and that seems to have been the case."

Mike Schussler, economist at T-Sec:

"It's a bit of a disappointment — in fact it's a big disappointment. The first quarter of this year isn't going to be much better what with the Transnet strikes and the electricity problems, especially in the Western Cape.

"For bonds the figure will be good. It'll be neutral for the rand but bad for the JSE.

"The annual average real growth for 2005 figure was as expected. But it is difficult to see how we could pick up momentum this year."

Dawie Roodt, chief economist at the Efficient Group:

"The number is worse than we expected. It's a bit of a disappointment. For the year, everyone was looking for the magical five percent number and it's unfortunate we couldn't get it. Five percent would have been nice.

"From a sentiment point of view, this is probably not going to be so nice for the market."

George Glynos, market analyst at Econometrix Treasury Management:

"The figure is a little softer than what we had anticipated. Not a great number at all.

"I haven't really had a chance yet to study the breakdown, but I see the mining and manufacturing sectors did not perform particularly well, which is clearly an indication of the strength of the rand. A disappointing figure."


I-Net Bridge

I found the following article which does not sing the typical sycophantic stance that we all see in the newspapers with their rosy assesments of SA's economy that the ANC would like us all believe when the reality on the ground suggests otherwise.

The Honeymoon is over
Barry Sergeant
Posted: Fri, 24 Feb 2006 08:00 | © Moneyweb Holdings Limited, 1997-2005

SPEAK to some of the leading lights – who follow South Africa – on Wall Street, in the City of London and those on Bay Street in Toronto, and much the same message comes across.

Foreign investors are sadder and sadder about South Africa’s increasingly whimsical investment environment.

While no reasonable analysis would elevate foreign investors to God-like status, by the same token there is overwhelming evidence that they are being taken for granted by South African policymakers. The record shows that foreign investors have played the single biggest role in South Africa’s economic development.

Their deep-rooted uplifting status can be traced back in large scale to the discovery of gold in and around the Witwatersrand in 1886, and before that to the discovery of diamonds in Kimberley. While the level of commitment by foreign investors waxed and waned over many decades, they were ultimately prepared to take calculated risks. On balance, South Africa has offered a comparatively rewarding story.

In mining specifically, foreign investors have played a critical role over many decades, and remain fundamentally supportive. Neal Froneman, CEO of SXR Uranium One, recently announced the successful raising of $149m to fund the construction of the Dominion mine near Klerksdorp, west of Johannesburg. Froneman raised far more than the initial $65m that had been pencilled in, thanks to heavy demand from foreign investors.

He argued that it would have been difficult to raise that kind of money in South Africa. “Junior mining companies are perceived as having high risk,” he said, adding that Canadian institutions “understand the risk-reward relationship” of junior mining companies.” Crucially, he also stated: “I dare say it would have been impossible to do it here in South Africa.” Beyond domestic and global resources, which remain neutral to race, colour and creed, foreign investors remain supportive of the JSE as a whole; in the year to date, they have been collective net buyers to the tune of more than R20bn worth of stocks listed in Johannesburg.

But now these are fragile times and the fabric of society is smouldering. As leading lights in some of the world’s biggest capital markets warn, South Africa’s honeymoon is over; 1994 was a dozen years ago. The legislative environment is increasingly uncertain, and foreign investors are hardly mentioned by key policymakers such as President Thabo Mbeki and Finance Minister Trevor Manuel.

While the cynics may argue that the leading lights in big capital markets should be named, they are simply the men and women who rate as the leading sales-traders and investment analysts in the world. They are the individuals who can take Froneman and match him and his story with investors who are prepared to stump up $149m for investing in South Africa’s earth.

Testing times and headwinds characterise the future. One of Toronto’s leading lights is increasingly troubled over left-of-centre utterances from the southernmost country on the continent, ranging from the recent threat to hit Sasol with a super tax, to increased mumblings on accelerating land redistribution, to ongoing threats of royalties for the mining sector, and worrying evidence that South Africa’s infrastructure is crumbling.

Government’s utter devotion to equity employment and related policy issues such as gender equality has become increasingly blind, and possibly even deadly. The recent breakdowns at Koeberg, a nuclear power station near Cape Town, are no joke. The station manager, Eskom, the state-owned power monopoly, lost three senior managerial engineering staff (two at Koeberg) all of whom worked in the field of nuclear energy. All three were white. It helped not when an 80mm bolt was found in a generator after new maintenance staff were reportedly “thrown in at the deep end”. You get burned if you play with fire, but you can go to hell if you play with nuclear installations. The problem goes far deeper. There are increasing numbers of power outages galvanizing attention on a deteriorating energy infrastructure and on faltering systems management. Eskom’s excuses – fires, phase imbalances, fog, rain and routine adjustments – are puerile. The bottom line is that Eskom has not invested adequately in surplus transmission and generation capacity. A period of sustained under-investment in national power stations and transmission network since the mid-1990s, has dealt up a toxic cocktail of insufficient reserve margins to cope with routine failures.

A prerequisite for economic growth in any civilised economy is the presence of predictable and sustainable electricity supply. In the long run, the inability of ensuring a steady and reliable supply of electricity will pose a threat to South Africa’s growth prospects. Besides this, power outages cause congestion and inconvenience millions of South Africans.

Foreign investors obtain the same sad information. If there is a golden thread running through crumbling infrastructure, then it is, without question, corruption.

In its recent annual Global Corruption Report, Transparency International said South Africa faces major challenges in combating corruption which is now endemic at the provincial and local government level, negatively affecting the capacity of the public sector to deliver services to the poor.

As a major issue, corruption ranks as government’s major apophasis apart from possibly Zimbabwe. That country’s meltdown remains an issue increasingly worrying to foreign investors, who moan in low tones of fear and loathing about a possible pointer to South Africa’s future direction. Once again, the problem is far deeper rooted; the ANC’s huge majority as the ruling party means that it has no oversight committee.

On the ground, while the concerns of foreign investors are increasingly ignored, and their financial commitment increasingly taken for granted, the South African economy is subjected to ever-increasing attacks in the form of government intervention. Black economic empowerment (BEE) rules are shifted like dangerous quicksands drifting in a desert, and there is no slippage of evidence that many BEE deals serve mainly to enrich elite cabals.

Thankfully there are some foreigners who are prepared to speak out. As early as December 2 2002, Marian Tupy of the Washington-based Cato Institute, a think-tank, argued that racial quotas established by the South African government “will likely result in economic harm to the country, and to black South Africans”.

As to the agreement that mining companies would raise $10bn over the next five years for the purchase and transfer of company stock to non-whites, Tupy argued that “this will drive down the profit margins in the industry and the mining companies will be forced to cut their costs by hiring fewer employees than they normally would, or by letting some of their employees go. As a result, unemployment will grow.”

That outcome, of course, is the direct opposite of what South Africa needs and what the government aspires to do. As an observer for a foreign-based entity, Tupy was fearless in noting that “South Africa’s top mining executives publicly express support” for BEE; however, “in private they are said to be gravely concerned about the cost associated with it. That is a bad sign, for it means that the businesses will now likely resort to political manoeuvring to escape charter requirements”.

South Africa today is economically freer than it ever was under apartheid, but its economic growth continues to lag the rate seen in many other developing nations. The ANC needs to murder its resentment of the free market, and to reverse its stubborn refusal to recognise that the country’s future would be crippled without foreign investors. The ANC must also get deadly serious about protecting the life and property of its very own citizens.

The ANC’s experiments of nationalising mineral and water rights, tinkering with changes in the process of agricultural expropriations, and expressing xenophobic views on foreigners owing property, have been destructive enough. The honeymoon is truly over. Sooner or later, the ANC will come to understand that it is under the oversight of foreign investors, a loose-knit band of investment professionals who communicate in milliseconds and who can, and do, make monumental decisions in seconds.

scathing article and I as a "forigner" can see a lot of what they are talking about as Im on the outside looking in.
ANC is too idealistic and not enough of a realist party

What a pile of inverted piffle. They economy is doing well, foreign investment is increasing and economic growth is still strong despite the recent slow down that is probably actually a good thing long term. "the honeymoon is truly over" Oh please. Who wrote this Tony Leon? SA Boy the ANC is actually far more realist vthan it ever was and has some very good plans in place to deal with SA's problems. And dont forget that it is BEE and AA that has sparked this economic boom.

did you know that foreign direct investment is at its HIGHEST LEVEL EVER?? Did you know that many major international property funds have been incredibly active in south africa since november. Did you know that last year volumes on the jse reached astronomical proportions, with massive increases in the number of foreign traders. Hardly a gloomy picture...

Millions benefit in SA's biggest boom


Maureen Marud
February 15 2006 at 11:48AM

The benefits of the longest economic upswing in South Africa's history are being shared by millions more than benefited in earlier boom times, financial analysts say.

The swell had boosted the steady growth of the black middle class, estimated to have more than doubled from 1,1 million in 1994 to 2,6 million by 2004, said Servaas van der Berg, professor of economics at Stellenbosch University.

"The government has spread the benefits of economic growth by increasing the payment of grants by about R30-billion a year over the past five years, to what is now an expenditure of about R52-billion a year," Van der Berg said.



Rian le Roux, an economist with Old Mutual, said South Africa could "probably be called the fiscal saints of the world" due to the government's healthy fiscal policies.

'It is more likely that we are on a long-term structural up-trend'
With a gross domestic product growth of about five percent last year, and possibly another five percent this year, "the headwinds our economy faced in the first years of democracy are now turning to tailwinds", Le Roux said.

He saw the current boom as a continuation of economic trends in the 1960s, when there was high growth, low inflation, low interest rates and a stable currency.

"We are moving back towards that environment.

"The interruption of the 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s is behind us. The economy has adjusted.

"If you look at just about anything in the economy at the moment, including car sales and consumer spending in general, it all points to the South African economy looking like it did in the 1960s."

Fuelling growth, consumer spending was the result of "lots of tailwinds in the form of low interest rates, significant tax cuts, employment growth, wage increases above inflation, and social support, which remains a key area", Le Roux said.

Also contributing were strong growth in private sector capital investment and, over the next few years, a government drive for infrastructure development.

Le Roux said the boom in car sales, which, according to seasonally adjusted figures, showed sales of about 35 000 cars a month, did not mean the economy was overheated, as some economists feared.

"It is more likely that we are on a long-term structural up-trend, although it is unlikely to be sustained at the same pace."

The two years of five percent GDP growth had to be translated into job creation, said Johann Els, another economist at Old Mutual.

"A labour force survey from Stats South Africa, published last month, showed about 650 000 new jobs had been created in the past 12 months in the formal and informal sectors," Els said.

If GDP growth was sustained, it would continue to create jobs, he predicted.

The boom in retail was demonstrated by shop shelves being emptied during the last festive season, with consumer spending at an all-time high, said Barrett Whiteford, head of credit card marketing at First National Bank (FNB).

Recent figures released by FNB showed credit card customers spent more than R3-billion in retail stores in December, a 35 percent increase over such spending in the equivalent period last year.

Retailers of jewellery, CDs and DVDs had experienced the highest increase in sales - more than 300 percent, Whiteford said.

The increase in consumer spending was a good indicator of the improved perception of the financial health among South Africans, primarily due to sustained lower interest rates.

PS: This a very good news for your beautiful country and I would like to share it with you!

PEACE TO AFRICA

What developments we are currrently seeing coming up in Durban is just the begining as I have said in the "Durbs Diss" due to the fact KZN was being run by mindless twats, nobody was willing to invest in KZN & development was slow, I visited a top financial planner & had meetings with alot of project managers & Acturial scientists & they say the the big building boom is still to come, most of the area north of the Umgeni is still to be developed & Moorelands are going be smiling from ear to ear selling their land on the north coast, & now with KSIA coming up in La Mercy they estimated that a large area's around the new airport will be developed into factories & storage wharehouses for many companies.

So watch this space

yip and a R2bn development is to be announced by moreland sometime in the next month. it is to be situated next to the marriot complex on umhlanga ridge....will be very interesting!!!

according to cia.gov in 2000 50 procent of the population from sa lives below the poverty line and in 2005 25 procent of the people were unemployt.how does this come?

haha u got to live to understand that anyway its way better than the cia said note thats 2000 we're in 2006 the future is here for the young like me

ps:guys the south africa forum is proof that sa is booming when was the last time u heard durbs ,joburg and ct fighting over who had the best developments or biggest projects ?? remember the bleak days at skyscaperpage.com boys

Black Buyers The New Big Spenders - 2006/03/19

SA growth set to slow
20/03/2006 14:05 PM

please merge the 2 economic threads. thanks.

Banks give R42bn for housing
24/05/2006 19:16 PM

19 SA firms on Forbes top list
28/04/2006 12:43 PM

Good going. When i read that a while back it intrigued me, pity we didnt have more!

R27bn for construction - Erwin
13/06/2006 16:33 PM

SA challenges China firms
22/06/2006

EU to make SA 'partner'
27/06/2006 21:56 PM

Investors Switch To Commercial - 2006/07/21

On CNBC, A British stock market analyst, was telling people that SA companies are a great investment now, as well as one of the fastest booming economiesin the world right now. This is some fantastic news. A little over a decade later, there is a possiblity (slim though it may be) of joining G8! Amazing, and I sure am proud. :)

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could could someone give me an idea of the basic gist of that article? Something about immigration I guess?

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Govt have also started a register of qualified SA's abroad, in order to lure them back to the country.

LOL :hilarious

Oh (let me wipe the tears of laughter from my eyes) ... the SA Government never ceases to amaze me. Do they honestly think that a "skilled shortage list" will lure the WISE back to South Africa when most expats are earning double (even more) the salary that they were earning in SA, most expats have a far better lifestyle than they ever had in SA, better education for their children, better (and subsidised) health care and most importantly, most expats live in safe countries with crime rates much lower than SA.

I suppose they have forgotten that CRIME EXPO has been seen and read by most expats - all over the world. Oh Lordy me .... you have to love Africa :)

i disagree, I have spent the past 10 years living all over the world and investing in SA. I plan to go back for the lifestyle which kicks any australian,kiwi, canadian etc lifestyle to pieces. I am lucky in that I will be able to retire at 40 with a substatial asset base so I dont really have the problems of the day to day south african. Neverthe less we could move anywher (have australian passport, british passport , wife has Green card) so we are lucky to have many OPTIONS and out of all those place where we have lived , we (me south african and my wife australian) still want to settle in SA.
Hopefully I can take my skills back for the countries benifit.
Never say Never. Once yopu have a kiwi passport you may think differently as it gives you an option whereas the saffiues that leave for what ever reason , the majority are economic immigrants (like me) who is earning 10 times what I could in SA and its tax free so make it 20 times. Most of the saffies I have met and worked with in the states, oz, eastern europe, kiwiland,Dubai etc) all have an ultimate goal of either haveing shit loads of cash in order to live well in SA or want another passport to give them a security blanket if the shit ever hits the fan.
I personally belive in SAs future and I belive if you are clever Sas growth and its emerging market position gives you better opotunities than the stale 1st world markets
just my 2 cents worth

i disagree, I have spent the past 10 years living all over the world and investing in SA. I plan to go back for the lifestyle which kicks any australian,kiwi, canadian etc lifestyle to pieces. I am lucky in that I will be able to retire at 40 with a substatial asset base so I dont really have the problems of the day to day south african. Neverthe less we could move anywher (have australian passport, british passport , wife has Green card) so we are lucky to have many OPTIONS and out of all those place where we have lived , we (me south african and my wife australian) still want to settle in SA.
Hopefully I can take my skills back for the countries benifit.
Never say Never. Once yopu have a kiwi passport you may think differently as it gives you an option whereas the saffiues that leave for what ever reason , the majority are economic immigrants (like me) who is earning 10 times what I could in SA and its tax free so make it 20 times. Most of the saffies I have met and worked with in the states, oz, eastern europe, kiwiland,Dubai etc) all have an ultimate goal of either haveing shit loads of cash in order to live well in SA or want another passport to give them a security blanket if the shit ever hits the fan.
I personally belive in SAs future and I belive if you are clever Sas growth and its emerging market position gives you better opotunities than the stale 1st world markets
just my 2 cents worthHear, hear SABOY- let that platteland living in another platteland keep on justifying her chicken run. Every1 is so sick of the negativity.

i disagree, I have spent the past 10 years living all over the world and investing in SA. I plan to go back for the lifestyle which kicks any australian,kiwi, canadian etc lifestyle to pieces. I am lucky in that I will be able to retire at 40 with a substatial asset base so I dont really have the problems of the day to day south african. Neverthe less we could move anywher (have australian passport, british passport , wife has Green card) so we are lucky to have many OPTIONS and out of all those place where we have lived , we (me south african and my wife australian) still want to settle in SA.
Hopefully I can take my skills back for the countries benifit.
Never say Never. Once yopu have a kiwi passport you may think differently as it gives you an option whereas the saffiues that leave for what ever reason , the majority are economic immigrants (like me) who is earning 10 times what I could in SA and its tax free so make it 20 times. Most of the saffies I have met and worked with in the states, oz, eastern europe, kiwiland,Dubai etc) all have an ultimate goal of either haveing shit loads of cash in order to live well in SA or want another passport to give them a security blanket if the shit ever hits the fan.
I personally belive in SAs future and I belive if you are clever Sas growth and its emerging market position gives you better opotunities than the stale 1st world markets
just my 2 cents worth

We obviously have different ideals when it comes to lifestyle. I have always said and will say again that you have always made the right move and having a foreign passport is definitely an extra bonus. With security (ample money and a foreign passport) as a foundation, you are well suited for a life in SA.

I for one will only return to SA if the ANC is dead and buried, unemployment is at a maximum of 5%, no street children, a hand full of beggers that know that they are not allowed to harass people, a public transport system that is like NZ's or even better (no mini bus taxis), a "respectable" crime rate and no shanty towns ... oh well, I guess that means that I will never return.

Thanks for your point of view ;)

P.S.The weather is fantastic in South Africa and that is the only thing that we are missing - therefore we are on our way to Brisbane - you have lived in BNE haven't you ?

Hear, hear SABOY- let that platteland living in another platteland keep on justifying her chicken run. Every1 is so sick of the negativity.

MEEEOOOW :runaway:

Nope lioved in Auckland and Sydney but spent loads of time in Adelaide (wifes home town) and Bris vegas cos its just like Durban, sporty, beachy, sunny, golfy, and party.

I do agree with what you say inso far as all our assets in SA are able to be liquidated in a day almost , transfered out (cos we bought as foreigners )and we can be on the next plane out should it all go pear shape.

Lets hope it doesnt but the fact remains that if you have money (as in real money $, euros) then "retiring" to SA makes seroius ecxonomic sence. I belkive that leaving to work when I was like 23 has allowed me to jump ahead of the game and gives me the luxury of choosing where we settle.

The crime, grime and whatever is part of the deal of being an african, living in africa and working in africa. It is a price you pay to be close to your roots and its all about that smell you have when they open the doors at JHB airport of the plane and you smell Africa for the first time in years and it makles you reaalise you wewre born there and will die there.
Thats my story but may not be the same for everyone.
BTW Brissie is the best place in Oz but for culture,and a Captonian way of life there is only one place-Melbourne

Enigma just because you hate the place does not mean everyone else does. Loads of people I know here have lived overseas for a while and moved back. If you read the SA Times in london it is full of shipping companies advertising services for people moving back. If there was no demand for such services why the hell would they waste their money placing ads in SA expat papers? You are so out of touch because of your bitterness it is pathetic. You pop up here to spout bile and then slink off again. It really is most annoying.

You know what? Just maybe I understand why Enigma is visiting often...to wake you guys up a bit. This Forum is dreadfully boring. You have no sense of humour in here, (except for a few individuals, like 2). I'm also pretty much sick of this squeeky clean boring "7de laan" family thing going on in here!

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So Mr H is really dead, huh?

I'm also pretty much sick of this squeeky clean boring "7de laan" family thing going on in here!


Dear ENIGMA,

You are a bitch.

Love Joburg.

:D

Now that's what I'm talking about! Love the tact...

Dear ENIGMA,

You are a bitch.

Love Joburg.

:D


LMAO!!! Haha favourite post of the day!

oooh catfights, I love it

Well....... You see, I think he's a bitch, but in a munchkin kind of way.

And munchkin bitches are farrrr nicer than just bitches.

:hug:

(sorry... couldn't resist the 7de Laan hug)

Hey joburg, get us some Gautrain construction shots, will ya? :D

I can show you a picture of where it says construction will start, but other than that the residents from the Mucklenek/Lukasrand Property Association have delayed construction AGAIN by applying to the Pretoria High Court for an order declaring that national government should have given the order for the Gautrain, and not the provincial government.

I have no clue why this should be the case, since two-thirds of the project was funded by Gauteng anyway.

Bunch of NIMBYs I tell you.

Guys, what ENIGMA is trying to say (and I know he will deny it, but if he is honest with himself he'll realise I speak the truth) is that he just wanted to get away from the blacks.

And now he has! Because Auckland has gotta be one of the most lily white looking places I've seen in a while.

And the economy this, and the crime rate that. Excuses excuses excuses. All veneer for his true reason for leaving. That he can't get on with the blacks, because they don't subscribe to his way of life. If he had been born in Auckland instead of South Africa, I'm sure he wouldn't have been such a miserable c**t in the first place.

Now how does THAT grab you for a sense of fun in the forums. Let's all be bitches.

I say no thank you very much to that.

actually Auckland is very "brown" with a massive Maori and pacific population South in Manakau and out west henderson way. Both have to be as sif as Umtata aka 1990 with delapidated houses, burnt out cars etc. Just watch Onece were warriors for a snap shot of typical New zealanders going about their day "cook the man some eggs bitch"
NZ has its politics driven by the influence of 10% of the population (rest were wiped out by the helpfull poms who fu*k NZ big time with the treaty of wangitari).Cant wait for Afermitive action to hit NZ and OZ as the ground swell for its implimentation is growing due to the high rate of crime, drug dependance, unemployment, alcoholisim etc in the minority non-white population.
Where would Enigma go then?

Guys,

time for me to add my 10cents worth. I have lived in London & Zurich for the last nine years. I earn good money, by UK standards, yet still only live in a 1 bed flat in a good area (Barnes - near Richmond). The UK, a supposedly 1st world country has major issues. Dis-enfranchised feral youth in the cities. A rapidly raising violent crime rate, massive under-investment in infrastructure means it is creaking at the seams. Yes you might be earning a whack more, by SA standards, however housing, travel, private medical (as I would never want to join the queue for NHS - which is almost bankrupt by the way...) means that in the end, money doesn't go as far as you would think. don't get me wrong - as a person who had no real direction, straight out of varsity, was a great move - Have gained experience, both work and socially, that will stand me in good stead. Financially I have a place in Ldn (will keep as an investment) and 2 properties in SA
However, like SA boy, I would say there in no place like home... in the next year or two will be back, and be able to live lifestyle that I want due to spending time in Europe.

nice one wazza, its seems the saffies in SA want out and the saffies out want back in. Well at least it keeps SAA busy.

Don't y'all just love how SA Boy always manages to wade through the bitching, keeping a level head and keeping the language clean? I have such admiration!

thanx mate ,i just laugh at it all cos i have been on both sides of the fence

warren what you said is so true. I moved from the UK to USA then to RSA and living here is way better than in those "first world countries". I wouldnt swap SA for anywhere on earth. I know so many saffas in the UK like you who are planning to return cos they realise that our lifestyle in SA is sooo much better. For the price of a dingy 1 bed flat in richmond you cpould have a 4 bed house near the beach in blouberg/big bay etc etc. I agree with Caisson Boys assessment of enigma. The fact is he cant stand the african way of life (for that read he cant stand black africans!!) People like him have no place in our country and it is good they leave. They are replaced by people like you, me and caisson boy who have experienced life in other countries, gained lots of skills and come here and appreciate what we have in SA and the fact that it is in a country like SA where you can make a real difference.

warren what you said is so true. I moved from the UK to USA then to RSA and living here is way better than in those "first world countries". I wouldnt swap SA for anywhere on earth. I know so many saffas in the UK like you who are planning to return cos they realise that our lifestyle in SA is sooo much better. For the price of a dingy 1 bed flat in richmond you cpould have a 4 bed house near the beach in blouberg/big bay etc etc. I agree with Caisson Boys assessment of enigma. The fact is he cant stand the african way of life (for that read he cant stand black africans!!) People like him have no place in our country and it is good they leave. They are replaced by people like you, me and caisson boy who have experienced life in other countries, gained lots of skills and come here and appreciate what we have in SA and the fact that it is in a country like SA where you can make a real difference.

Yes, see this is exactly what I mean. Make a difference. I.e., see a bigger picture than one's own immediate circumstance. It is easier to pack up and go somewhere like NZ, but I would not pick that. As for living in the UK... I agree that, even though I am pretty poor here, my standard of living is way way way above what it was in London.

You know what? Just maybe I understand why Enigma is visiting often...to wake you guys up a bit. This Forum is dreadfully boring. You have no sense of humour in here, (except for a few individuals, like 2). I'm also pretty much sick of this squeeky clean boring "7de laan" family thing going on in here!

----
So Mr H is really dead, huh?

Insightful

The crime, grime and whatever is part of the deal of being an african, living in africa and working in africa. BTW Brissie is the best place in Oz but for culture,and a Captonian way of life there is only one place-Melbourne

Melbourne :drunk:

If you hate the ANC, then you hate South Africa. I hope you get stomach cancer and die.

^^ :kiss:

:)

ok, this wont do much for our economy. Take it somewhere else...to the Shebeen, where the drunks hang out!


-

Transnet to spend R93 billion on infrastructure
February 3, 2010

Transport parastatal Transnet will increase infrastructure spend by R93 billion in the next five years, its acting chief told Parliament on Wednesday.

Chris Wells told Parliament's portfolio committee on transport that Transnet, which had spent R74 billion in the past five years on projects such as upgrading ports and building pipelines, had created hundreds of thousands of jobs for South Africa.

"Some studies we are engaged in show this infrastructure programme has had a significant benefit effect to SA, both on employment and creating industries," he said.

"We believe hundreds of thousands jobs have been created. It could be as many as 500 000."

"Early indications" were that a new five year plan to be finalised by the end of February would increase investment to R93. billion.


"It is exciting that we have the capacity to do that," he said.

Wells said Transnet had managed to raise R19 billion "very cost effectively" in the debt capital markets.

It was important for South Africa to develop foreign sources of funding as there was a "limited capacity" in South Africa.

"Particularly as the total South African infrastructure programme gains traction there is going to be a need for offshore funding," he said.

Transnet has secured R4 billion in offshore investment for its infrastructure programme. The parastatal also recently listed its global medium term notes bond programme.

"This will enable us to issue in the US and European markets anytime going forward as the circumstances are advantageous for us," he said. - Sapa


http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=5337730

Province to dangle R100 billion in real estate in 'mega' bid for investment

March 12, 2010 Edition 2

AN201L LEWIS

THE Western Cape government hopes to attract investment to the province with "mega projects", including the industrial expansion of Saldanha on the West Coast as one of the growth corridors in the region.

The next mega project for Cape Town will entail using provincial- and national-owned buildings as leverage for private sector investment.

Finance, Economic Development and Tourism MEC Alan Winde told the Southern African-German Chamber of Commerce and Industry yesterday that the province owned about R100 billion in property, but the return on these assets "was almost zero".

The cost of maintaining these buildings was a financial drain on the provincial coffers.

Winde said the province had to remove planning red tape if it wanted to put its assets on the market. The government would have to "pre-zone" certain precincts or areas so these developments could take place.

The Woodstock precinct, emerging as a cultural and tourism corridor to the city, should be pre-zoned so that planning applications in line with tourism objectives for that area would be assured of approval.

"We must zone the precincts in the way we want to steer development (there)."

In other moves to get the most gain from provincial assets, Winde said unused property at schools could be used for low-cost or gap housing. This would also boost safety at these schools.

A provincial building on prime V&A Waterfront land was being used to store medical supplies, Winde said.

If used differently, the building could be a more lucrative source of income.

Winde said the project, driven by the provincial Department of Public Works and Transport, would involve partnerships with all spheres of government and the port authority.

A business plan was being compiled by academic specialists and would be ready for consideration by the business sector by the end of next month.

The province would also have to create the legislative framework to allow these developments to gain approval without being slowed by red tape.

This project would be replicated in other municipalities.

anel.lewis@inl.co.za

Roundup: China-South Africa strategic partnership makes new progress: Chinese leader
CAPE TOWN, South Africa, March 30 (PNA/Xinhua) -- China's top political advisor Jia Qinglin said Monday that "China-South Africa strategic partnership has made new progress in recent years."

Jia, chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), China's top advisory body, made the remark while talking with Mninwa Mahlangu, chairman of the National Council of Provinces of South Africa in Cape Town.

During their talks, they pledged to upgrade strategic partnership between China and South Africa.

South Africa was the last leg of Jia's ten-day African tour which already took him to Cameroon and Namibia.

China and South Africa, which forged the strategic partnership on equality, mutual benefit and common development in 2007, have witnessed frequent high-level visits and developed deeper political trust, he said.

Mahlangu welcomed Jia's visit and reviewed the progress in bilateral cooperation since the two countries established diplomatic ties in 1998.

China has become South Africa's biggest trade partner and exporter as bilateral trade volume hit a historic high of more than 16 billion U.S. dollars in 2009 despite the international financial crisis, according to the Chinese Customs.

Of African nations, South Africa was the one drawing the biggest number of Chinese tourists and students who pursued higher education in the country at the southern tip of Africa.

China and South Africa have supported each other on issues concerning their core and major interests, Jia said, adding the two countries have coordinated closely on international affairs.

Jia noted that South Africa would host the FIFA World Cup in summer, which is the first one to be staged in African continent.

"This is the glory and pride of all peoples in the African continent. We wish you a successful and wonderful World Cup," Jia told Mahlangu.

Looking to the future, Jia said China would like to work with South Africa to deepen cooperation in all fields and bring bilateral partnership to a new high.

Mahlangu proposed the two countries learn from each other and work closely in trade and investment. He also reaffirmed that South Africa would adhere to the one-China policy.

Jia and Mahlangu agreed on furthering the exchanges between the CPPCC and the National Council of Provinces of South Africa.

On China-Africa relations, Jia said China is committed to boosting the all-round relationship between the world's biggest developing country and the continent with the largest number of developing countries.

Jia said China has paid much attention to implementing the eight new measures introduced by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao last November in Egypt, which included debt cancellation, agriculture production, infrastructure and education.

Jia said China would help African countries cope with the challenges of the international financial crisis and seek sustainable development.

Mahlangu praised the role of China-Africa Cooperation Forum, saying South Africa will work with China to carry out the mechanism and deepen China-Africa cooperation.

Jia will also travel to Johannesburg and Pretoria to continue his visit to the country. He is scheduled to meet with South African President Jacob Zuma on Tuesday afternoon.

Jia arrived in Cape Town on Sunday for an official visit to the country at the southern tip of Africa.

In a written statement issued upon his arrival at the airport, Jia said China-South Africa relationship had advanced in an all-round way since the two countries established diplomatic ties in 1998.

The two countries, which forged the strategic partnership on equality, mutual benefit and common development in 2007, have developed deeper political trust, achieved fruitful results in trade, culture, education, science, and worked closely on international issues, Jia said.

Jia added it was in the fundamental interests of both countries and their people to seek a stronger China-South Africa relationship, which will help boost regional and world peace and development.

"I believe the visit will increase understanding, expand common ground, boost exchanges and deepen cooperation in a bid to cement bilateral strategic partnership," Jia said.

Jia said his visit was aimed at boosting the understanding and friendship between the two nations and consolidating the cooperation in all fields. (PNA/Xinhua) http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?idn=4&sid=&nid=4&rid=267161

SOUTH AFRICA'S REVENUE BETTER THAN EXPECTED, SAYS FINANCE MINISTER
PRETORIA, May 13 (NNN-BUANEWS) -- South Africa's revenue for last year was more than what was expected, says Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan.

Tabling his department's Budget Vote in Parliament on Tuesday, he said: "The books have been closed on last year. Revenue was about 8.0 billion Rand more than we expected, and expenditure a bit less."

The country's budget deficit was 6.7 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) which was rather better than the 7.3 per cent anticipated, although it was considerably wider than the 1.0 percent of the GDP recorded in 2008-2009.

Gordhan said the minister's committee on the budget and the Treasury had already begun working on next year's Budget.

"Preliminary data suggest that we will see moderate economic growth this year, perhaps somewhat higher than we projected in February," he said.

Following on Statistics South Africa's (Stats SA) data showing that unemployment rose in the first quarter of the year, Gordhan said this showed that more must be done to restructure the economy and to create jobs.

He said South Africa could learn from developed countries which were experiencing financial difficulties. Though substantial improvements to remuneration and career progression had been made in the public sector, employment in the country needed to strike the right balance between better wages and employing more civil servants, said Gordhan.

"If we are to achieve sustainable improvements in living standards for all, we have to ensure that salary increases are affordable, equitable and aligned with improvements in performance and service delivery," said Gordhan.http://namnewsnetwork.org/v2/read.php?id=120096

GOVT MUST DO MORE TO CREATE JOBS, SAYS SOUTH AFRICAN OPPOSITION PARTIES
CAPE TOWN, may 14 (NNN-BUANEWS) -- The government must do more to create jobs and boost the economy, South African opposition leaders said in the National Assembly Thursday following President Jacob Zuma's presentation of the Presidency's Budget vote.

This came despite President Zuma saying there had been "visible progress" made in the government's identified priorities, including job creation, and that the Industrial Policy Action Plan launched in February would create new decent jobs.

On the first-year anniversary of the new administration, the Leader of the Opposition, Athol Trollip, said the country was still awaiting a clear policy on job creation, following the loss of nearly one million jobs last year.

He also asked President Zuma what had become of the two-tier labour dispensation for youth, announced by Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan in his Budget Speech in February.

Trollip also said ministers were yet to show they were accountable to Parliament and called this a "disdain of Parliament and the Constitution". He said his party, the Democratic Alliance (DA) would not hesitate to take those members who refused to be held to account to court.

Congress of the People (Cope) deputy president Mbhazima Shilowa said the country needed to move beyond social grant support and towards the creation of sustainable jobs, but pointed out that the government was focusing more on "bling" than jobs.

Shilowa said a ballooning expenditure on an expanded executive, spending on luxury cars, five-star hotel accommodation, the expensive state visit to Britain and the increase in the spousal support office, all hindered the government's ability to spend on the creation of economic opportunities.

He said ministers could still get away with murder because many were still involved with clinching tenders.

However, Shilowa said the FIFA World Cup was a chance for the country to "forge a national unity" and urged all South Africans to put their support behind Bafana Bafana.

He also welcomed the government's HIV testing campaign and the president's public AIDS test, adding that he agreed with the Minister of Health Aaron Motsoaledi that everything should be done to source cheaper ARV drugs for those with HIV.

Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) president Mangosuthu Buthelezi urged the President to create a free trade zone in Sub-Saharan Africa, which would increase the size of the immediate market available to businesses and offer more opportunities for local companies.

Buthelezi said South Africa should provide funding for infrastructure to other African countries, provided that the work was carried out by a South African business.http://namnewsnetwork.org/v2/read.php?id=120224

SA economy picks up speed with 4,6% first-quarter growth

South Africa’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 4,6% in the first quarter of this year, exceeding market expectations, which had forecast growth of about 4%.

The first-quarter expansion compares with a 3,2% rise in the final quarter of 2009, and was the highest quarter-on-quarter increase since the 5,5% growth recorded in the second quarter of 2008.

The Finance Ministry welcomed the positive growth, saying that this was good news for the economy, particularly in the current difficult environment.

Economists.co.za director Mike Schussler agreed that the GDP growth recorded in the first quarter of the year was “really good” at a time when the world economic recovery, and especially in Europe, was still facing challenges.

He said that South Africa was going ahead at full steam and that a number of the larger economic sectors had performed well during the quarter.

The manufacturing and mining sectors had made the largest contributions to the quarterly GDP growth of 1,3 percentage points and 0,8 of a percentage point, respectively.

Statistics South Africa (StatsSA) pointed out that the mining and quarrying sector had grown by 15,4% in the first quarter, driven by increases in the coal mining and the mining of other metal ores.

On a year-on-year basis, the mining and quarrying sector had grown by 6,5%.

Further, the manufacturing industry had grown by 8,4% quarter-on-quarter and by 3,1% year-on-year, driven by strong growth in the basic iron and steel, nonferrous metal products, metals products and machinery division, as well as the petroleum, chemical products, rubber and plastic products division.

However, Schussler cautioned that GDP growth for the remainder of the year might be slower than the first quarter’s 4,6% growth, as a number of price increases, including electricity, water, rates and taxes, could slow the economic growth somewhat.

This could also prolong the jobless growth trend, he said.

While the country’s GDP had grown in the first quarter of the year, the unemployment rate also increased quarter-on-quarter, pushing the jobless rate back over 25%, with 4,31-million people unemployed.

The Finance Ministry urged both the private and public sector to do more to restructure the economy to create more jobs, particularly for the youth.

"It is vital that the growth potential of South Africa is increased to ensure both sustainable job creation and development," it said in a statement.

Meanwhile, StatsSA highlighted that the nominal value added in the economy during the first quarter of the year amounted to about R627-billion.

This was R6-billion higher than the value added in the previous quarter and about R47-billion more than in the first quarter of 2009.

Year-on-year, South Africa’s GDP grew by 1,6% in the first quarter, recording the first positive year-on-year growth since the fourth quarter of 2008.

Companies contribute R134 billion to fiscus
May 31, 2010

SA's larger companies contributed R134 billion to the fiscus in their financial years up to a March 31, 2009 cut off, a survey released on Monday has shown.

The R134 billion consisted of R61 billion of their own taxes borne, and a further R73 billion collected on behalf of the revenue authorities.

The third annual PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Total Tax Contribution (TTC) Survey for large South African companies -- in which 45 companies participated -- showed that despite the recession, the country's largest companies continued to contribute a significant proportion of the country's overall tax receipts.

It also emphasised that larger companies paid many other business taxes, apart from corporate income tax and acted as important collecting agents for the South African Revenue Authorities.

"The services that large companies perform as unpaid tax collectors represent a valuable contribution to the fiscus and the national economy," PwC director responsible for the South African TTC initiative Charles de Wet said in a statement. Participating companies in the current survey reported a decline in profitability as compared to 2008, with profits being some 14 percent lower on average.

Nevertheless, taxes borne by these 45 companies increased 12 percent, the survey found.

They paid taxes on income and profits (i.e. corporate income tax, mining taxes, secondary tax on companies, and tax on retirement funds) in excess of R50 billion -- more than 27 percent of government's total receipts from these sources.

An additional 34 cents in other business taxes was borne for every R1 of corporate income tax incurred.

Taking into account these other business taxes, such as customs and excise duties, irrecoverable value-added tax, fuel-related and transaction taxes, the total taxes borne by participating companies exceeded R61 billion, representing almost 10 percent of total estimated government taxation receipts from the relevant taxes, according to the survey.

According to Paul de Chalain, tax leader of PwC in SA, similar surveys conducted in other countries showed the total tax rate in SA was not out of line with other jurisdictions.

Canada had the lowest total tax rate, at 27 percent, with the highest being Belgium, at 52 percent.

"South Africa, at 33 percent, compares closely with the Netherlands, at 31 percent, and India and Australia, both at 35 percent," he said.

On average, for every R1 of corporate income tax borne, participating companies collected and paid over taxes of R1.60.

According to the survey, approximately 36 percent of the R73 billion collected and paid over to Sars was in respect of employment taxes (pay-as-you-earn and the Unemployment Insurance Fund levy), with three other large sources -- excise duties, fuel levies, and value-added tax -- each accounting for approximately 20 percent. - Sapa

http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=5493527

More important that the Q1 growth to me is the reduction in the deficit.

PRESIDENT ZUMA WOOS INDIAN INVESTORS
PRETORIA, June 4 (NNN-BUANEWS) -- President Jacob Zuma, noting that India has a burgenoning middle class of some 300 million people, has described the country as a crucial partner for South Africa's long-term economic growth strategy.

"We have identified India as a strategic partner for South Africa with good reason. This country boasts a burgeoning middle class of approximately 300 million," he told top business executives from India and South Africa at a forum in Mumbai Thursday.

President Zuma, together with several Cabinet ministers and about 200 of the country's business leaders, is in India in a bid to strengthen economic and commercial inter-action between South Africa and the south Asian giant. It is his first official visit to Asia since taking office in May last year.

President Zuma said India's economic transformation over the years had highly influenced several countries to consider changes in their industrial and economic policies and would continue to do so in decades to come.

"A decade of continued growth in the midst of the recent economic crisis has left India as one of the world's largest recipient of foreign direct investment (FDI)," he noted.

He hoped the visit would ensure that the two countries worked further to deepen their already existing warm relations.

South Africa, he said, recognized the fact that in order to strengthen its brand globally, it was imperative to invest all its efforts in making sure that the environment remained conducive for investments and potential investors.

India's sustained economic growth has continued unabated at a rate of 5.0 per cent over the past decade with the country's economy growing from 250 billion USD in the early 1990s, to above 1.0 trillion USD, outperforming many developing economies.

Income per capita also grew at the same rate, explaining the massive increase in personal wealth. India is now the world's 12th largest economy, with a nominal gross domestic product (GDP) of more than 8.0 trillion rand (about 1.045 trillion USD).

President Zuma said traditional economies such as Europe and the Unites States were being joined by the new "engines" of development from the developing world, with countries such as India and South Africa leading the charge.

"In the last decade, the Indian economy has undergone significant reforms and delivered unsurpassed and consistent growth," said President Zuma, adding that the presence of Indian companies had been stamped in international markets.

The World Bank Group's Annual Doing Business Report for 2010 compared global regulation in 183 countries. From these global economies, South Africa ranked 34th for ease of doing business. In terms of overall competitiveness, South Africa was ranked 45th ahead of countries such as Poland and Mexico.

South Africa was also ranked as the 18th most attractive Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) destination world-wide, according to the 2007 FDI Confidence Index compiled by the global management consulting firm, AT Kearney.

President Zuma told his audience, which included senior Indian government officials and business leaders, that South Africa's three-year Industrial Policy Action Plan would seek to expand production in value-added sectors to promote the creation of decent jobs.

These plans would be boosted by the strengthening of ties between South Africa and India as the economic relations between two countries were already very strong.

"Just last year, total trade between South Africa and India was in excess of 4.5 billion USD from a negligible 45 million USD since the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1993," said President Zuma.

South African companies offered exceptional partners, not only for the domestic market, but also the broader African continent and the world, he said. http://namnewsnetwork.org/v2/read.php?id=122486

I guess this belongs here :)

-----

INTERNATIONAL SOCCER VISITORS TAKE TIME OUT TO VIEW PROPERTIES, REPORTS PAM GOLDING PROPERTIES
PUBLISHED 17 JUN 2010

With South Africans wholeheartedly in the grip of World Cup Soccer fever, some of the international visitors to our shores are taking time out to view some of the prime-located residential properties on offer and already Pam Golding Properties...

With South Africans wholeheartedly in the grip of World Cup Soccer fever, some of the international visitors to our shores are taking time out to view some of the prime-located residential properties on offer and already Pam Golding Properties (PGP) reports a number of enquiries mainly in the coastal areas.

Ling Dobson, PGP’s area principal in Knysna says there’s been a surge in attendance at show days over the past two weekends. “We have had enquiries from French and Italian visitors who are here for the World Cup, who are mainly interested in properties with sea views in the R3-R5 million price range, for use as leisure homes when visiting South Africa on holiday. We are also in contact with an Italian who is travelling to Knysna in two weeks’ time to view properties with a view to purchase. Even just prior to the World Cup we sold a property in Knysna to French buyers from Brenton-on-Sea.

“However what is interesting is that suddenly the positive sentiment generally seems to have sparked a dramatic increase in enquiries from South African home buyers from Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town, as well as local buyers in this area. While this demand is mainly for homes, there are also enquiries for commercial properties, which is a very positive indicator,” she says. Dobson says with the new road around the lagoon now complete the entrance into Knysna is as appealing as any prime international resort. “The visitors are making good use of our walking and cycle paths, and they all love to walk. In addition to the World Cup - with the Oyster Festival taking place here soon, we believe over the next few months we will see increased activity in our property market,” she adds.

In KwaZulu-Natal, PGP’s Umhlanga office reports strong interest from a number of German investors who are seeking leisure homes in the R5 million price range, located close to the beach and with sea views. Says Elwyn Schenk, PGP’s area principal: “This is a group of friends who are all interested in property here. They are very impressed with Umhlanga and know the PGP brand. In addition we are assisting a Brazilian buyer, who says this is a fantastic place to buy property, who is looking in the price range up to R1.7 million. Another visitor, a young, male UK buyer, is looking for an apartment close to the beach and in the R2 million price bracket.”

Says Dr Andrew Golding, CE of the Pam Golding Property group: “This illustrates the high desirability of South African property for international investors. From this initial, encouraging response it is apparent that the Soccer World Cup is exposing our beautiful country to a broad cross-section of visitors for the very first time, and who hopefully will become regular visitors to our country. “

In Rustenburg the local PGP office is holding a number of property expos – including an exhibition at the Wigwam Hotel - in order to showcase leisure property to visitors. PGP area principal Ian Straarup says overseas buyers are mainly interested in properties in a tranquil, scenic environment, particularly those which have a strong African flavour , for example game farms and smallholdings. “They are looking for value for money and probably properties ranging in size from 15ha, and not necessarily in residential areas.”
Meanwhile from Germany, Gaby Moessner, PGP’s manager based in the Munich area, reports that World Cup Soccer fever is running high with considerable interest being shown in South Africa. “All over Europe and especially in Germany there is huge media exposure for South Africa. During 2009 and prior to this event 50 percent of my clients were those interested in buying a property in South Africa with a view to the World Cup, for example a guesthouse or B&B. These buyers were mainly from Germany, Austria and Switzerland, with the main focus on the Western Cape – and Somerset West in particular, with the second highest interest shown in Mpumalanga in areas such as White River and Hoedspruit, with proximity to Kruger Park and value for money of key importance.”

In terms of residential property, Moessner says currently enquiries are mainly for houses and apartments initially for holiday and later for retirement use, in the price range from R2-R3.5 million and situated along the Garden Route, Eastern Cape and south coast of KwaZulu-Natal. “However these are clients who have already visited South Africa or who are planning a trip after the World Cup. I definitely see good prospects for property sales following this event as many of our buyers first research the market, and may then consider looking at homes for leisure or retirement at competitive prices,” she says.

Issued by Gaye de Villiers

Source: MSN Property News (http://property.za.msn.com/news_item.aspx?news_ref=424495)

The no. 1 conference destination in Africa and the Middle East

Cape Town still tops as it secures four more association conferences
Monday, June 21, 2010



By securing the bids for no less than four association conferences, Cape Town has cemented its reputation as the no. 1 conference destination in Africa and the Middle East. With excitement running high these wins hopefully foreshadow Bafana Bafana’s victories during the biggest sport spectacle in the world, the 2010 FIFA World Cup. The bids secured are for the:
- IGPA Annual International Generics Conference in 2011
- IFIP Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (Interact) in 2013
- World Small Animal Veterinary Association (WSAVA) World Congress in 2014
- Congress of the International Society of University Colon and Rectal Surgeons (ISUCRS) in 2014
Securing these bids comes after close collaboration between the associations’ local organising committees, the Cape Town & Western Cape Convention Bureau, the Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC) and in some cases Professional Conference Organisers.
“Cape Town remains the jewel in Africa’s business tourism crown. Our improved infrastructure combined with excellent service and our world-renowned hospitality will ensure that the delegates of these conferences have an experience they will never forget. By conservative estimations these conferences will give the Western Cape economy a R72.25 million injection. In addition to the 31 conferences already taking place after the World Cup, these conferences give credence to the belief that there is life after the 2010 FIFA World Cup,” says Calvyn Gilfellan, CEO of Cape Town Routes Unlimited (CTRU), destination marketing organisation for Cape Town and the Western Cape.
According to CTICC Managing Director, Dirk Elzinga, “Securing these conferences is no mean feat in an increasingly competitive international meetings market. One of our challenges is lead times that are becoming notably shorter. These challenges have, however, not stopped the destination from retaining the 35th position in the ICCA (International Congress and Convention Association) global ranking. This shows that the destination remains relevant despite stiff competition.”
Prof. Paul Goldberg, member of the local organizing committee of the ISUCRS conference added that they are thrilled that their congress will be taking place in Cape Town as they hope the conference will promote the field of University Colon and Rectal Surgeons in Africa. Arrangements for this 4-day conference are being finalised by Eastern Sun Events. The WSAVA World Congress will be put together by SAVETCON and Cape Town fought off competition from Singapore, Germany and Thailand to win this bid. As a result of all four bids a total of 5 600 delegates will visit our shores over 19 conference days. Now, if only Bafana Bafana could emulate Cape Town and beat the Germans on the soccer pitch.

Africa is best kept secret of investors



By Bianca Capazorio and Thandanani Mhlanga

South Africa is on the edge of tremendous opportunity, the country heard on the first day of the Fortune, Time and CNN Global Forum in Cape Town.

The forum, which started at the Cape Town International Convention Centre yesterday, saw world leaders, and some of the world's biggest names in business, meeting to discuss the global business climate.

Leaders at the forum include the heads of major companies such as Coca-Cola, China Mobile, Time Warner Inc and De Beers. Former US president Bill Clinton will speak today. About 20 of Time's list of the world's 100 most influential people are also attending.

Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies said yesterday that the conference focused on "global trends and challenges" as well as local issues.

Yesterday's discussions centred on the good investment climate in South Africa and Africa.

Time editor Michael Elliott said South Africa was riding an "extraordinary wave of energy and optimism", not just around the World Cup, but also because the country was "on the verge of tremendous opportunity".

In a live crossing from the G20 summit in Canada, President Jacob Zuma said Africa was seeing massive growth, with sub-Saharan Africa showing the third highest growth rates in the world, after India and China.

Zuma said the conference had brought "the drivers of economic destiny" to South Africa at a time of great excitement around the World Cup, which was proving that "faith in Africa had not been misplaced".

John Huey, editor-in-chief of Time, said whatever South Africa's real problems, the country had come far, becoming a stable democracy and a regional economic powerhouse.

Many of the speakers also hailed the change in perceptions of South Africa and Africa thanks to the World Cup and the changing political and economic climates.

Mo Ibrahim, chairman of the Mo Ibrahim Foundation, said the world's best kept business secret was Africa, where returns could be as high as 150 percent.

But the view of many international business leaders of the continent was of Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, Somalia and starving children, because of a lack of research into and reportage about Africa's economies.

"If you compare an African company with and Indian company, there are 15 times more reports on the Indian company. Chinese companies get 12 times more coverage.

"Where there is no light, there is no knowledge."

Businessman Cyril Ramaphosa said that despite African labour costs being higher than in other developing countries, some of his African investments had still made "enormous money". He declined to go into detail about his business interests, but said one company was a bank and the other a cellular company.

Earlier, at a breakfast linked to the forum, Gra231a Machel told hundreds of influential women from all over the world about her work on social issues and development across Africa.

Machel spoke of the struggle for African women in business, and her latest initiative, New Faces, New Voices, which is aimed at getting African business to be more inclusive of women, both as executives and as customers of the products financial institutions offered.

Machel said she was meeting major players in the agricultural sector next month to ensure that women's voices were heard in that sector, too.

"In Africa we say women feed our nation," she said, but added that while African women were doing the feeding, they were not involved in the decision-making.

Referring to her marriages to two world leaders, Nelson Mandela and the late Samora Machel, former president of Mozambique, she said she took exception to being described as a woman who had married two presidents.

"Marrying someone is not any achievement at all. You can't put it in your CV. I didn't marry any president, I married two extraordinary human beings. That's my weakness, I am attracted to strong people... people who are better than myself. I married them for their minds and the way they were able to influence change."

Members of the Nigerian Ogoni ethnic group picketed outside the meeting venue and handed over a petition addressed to the CEO of the Royal Dutch Shell Group, which has extensive oil interests in Nigeria.

The Ogoni Solidarity Forum, formed to fight against Nigerian internal colonialism, accused the company of cruel exploitation of vast crude oil and gas deposits in Ogoni towns and villages.

The demonstrators were told Royal Dutch Shell CEO Peter Voser had accepted their memorandum.

Barry Wuganaale, project co-ordinator of the Ogoni Solidarity Forum, said there were more than 100 oil wells in Ogoniland linked to six oil fields, officially drilled by Shell and its business partners between 1958 and 1993.

"We want compensation for the exploitation done on our land... where 900 million barrels of crude oil were mined."

Supporters of the Palestinian Freedom of Movement Campaign in Cape Town were also there to demonstrate against "ongoing genocide against Palestinians". They accused capitalists, some of whom they said were attending the global forum, of keeping Palestinians in "open-air prisons and concentration camps".

Published on the web by Business Report on June 27, 2010. © Business Report 2010. All rights reserved. http://secure-za.imrworldwide.com/cgi-bin/m?rnd=1278010483406&ci=za-independent&cg=0&cc=0&sr=1024x768&cd=24&lg=en-US&je=y&ck=y&tz=2&fl=10&si=http%3A//www.busrep.co.za/general/print_article.php%3FfArticleId%3D5531328%26fSectionId%3D561%26fSetId%3D662&rp=http%3A//www.busrep.co.za/index.php%3FfSectionId%3D561%26fArticleId%3D5531328

World Cup to entice investors
Jul 01 2010 14:42

Johannesburg - The 2010 FIFA World Cup has had many direct infrastructure benefits, but some of the leading business icons globally have also expressed massive confidence in South Africa as an investment destination.

This is one of the key points to emerge from a briefing held on Thursday in Sandton. It was attended by the CEO of the Local Orgnising Committee (LOC) Danny Jordaan, Gauteng Premier Nomvula Mokonyane and MEC for Transport Bheki Nkosi.

Jordaan was adamant that the mega-event would prove to be a boon for investment and growth going forward.

"News out of the global economic forum that took place in Cape Town recently is that some of the leading business icons globally have expressed massive confidence in South Africa as an investment destination," he said.

When asked about the economic impact of the World Cup on the Gauteng economy, Mokonyane said: "The greatest impact that the World Cup will have on economic performance is that it has exposed the government to new and faster ways of working. The experience of the World Cup has improved the ability of government to govern and to deliver services at an even faster rate.

"Government will not be the same again. In partnership with the private sector we have realised that we can deliver services and infrastructure. This I believe will be the lasting legacy of the World Cup for South Africans," she said.

Reports calculating the economic impact of the competition have abounded. Just a month before the World Cup kicked off, Grant Thornton projected that about 370 000 foreign visitors would flock to South Africa for the tournament. The month-long competition was expected to add R93bn to the national economy.

A recent report by credit card company Visa shows that spending by Visa cardholders increased to about $566m - or about R4.28bn - in the first quarter of the year, a sharp increase over the same period in 2009.

The increase in inbound tourism spend is likely to increase because of the World Cup, which is proving to be a big gain for the tourism sector. Between kick-off on 11 June and 20 June, about 45 000 Visa transactions were recorded.

There are expectations that the economic impact will not be limited to tourism spend, and the global PR for brand South Africa will have a knock-on effect on investor perceptions.

Jordaan then gave advice to the Brazilian journalists gathered at the hearing.

"In four years time this mega-event will be coming to your country, these questions will be asked of you as well, you need to build infrastructure, not only to so deliver a successful event but so that you secure economic growth for the future."

Addressing the performance of the transport system, Nkosi said: "In the beginning we had some glitches; however, as time went on we had time to iron out any niggles and we believe the system is performing satisfactorily."

He added that government invested more than R40bn rand to ensure a safe, efficient and reliable public transportation system for the World Cup.

- I-Net Bridge

Source: News24 (http://www.fin24.com/Economy/World-Cup-to-entice-investors-20100701)

‘Brain drain’ in South Africa showing signs of reversing

Staffing solution group Adcorp's latest ‘Employment Survey' showed that about 39 000 South African job seekers had returned to the country from foreign countries over the past year, suggesting a ‘brain drain' reversal trend.

The study anticipated that this figure would rise to around 120 000 people returning home as foreign work contracts expire.

The only insurance company in South Africa catering exclusively for graduate professionals, Professional Provident Society (PPS) Insurance, backed this assumption saying that it had noticed trends among its members that indicated that they were considering returning to South Africa. "We have seen an increased interest from our overseas members to maintain and upgrade their benefits, which can be a good indicator that they intend to return to the country."

PPS CEO Mike Jackson pointed out that the company had noticed a decrease in the number of its members cancelling their policies owing to emigration.

"This suggests that many South African graduate professionals are not only more optimistic about the future in South Africa, but are also seeing improved career prospects here.

"The so-called brain drain in South Africa is finally showing signs of reversing, with indications that skilled graduate professionals who have left the country are beginning to show signs of returning home, and with fewer of those who do remain, choosing to emigrate."

Jackson noted that there could be a number of reasons for this trend including: struggling European markets, which made for tougher employment conditions overseas, coupled with increased visa restrictions in the UK, and a successful hosting of the 2010 FIFA World Cup that could have prompted many South Africans to reconsider moving overseas.

OECD: Reform needed for SAfrica economic growth

PRETORIA, South Africa — An international economic body on Monday urged South Africa to use the success of hosting the recent FIFA World Cup to implement labor and market reforms that could deliver higher employment and living standards.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, releasing its first economic survey of South Africa, also said the country should do away with restrictive economic regulations that retard the country's growth.

The month-long World Cup tournament helped boost the South Africa's gross domestic product over the past four years and spawned huge transportation improvements. According to estimates by UBS Investment Research, it also created more than 330,000 jobs but many of those were temporary and low-paid.

OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurria told reporters Monday that the World Cup infrastructure in transportation and other services would continue to provide employment and spur industry. But Gurria said South Africa needed to remove entry barriers inhibiting trade and skilled job seekers.

South Africa is known for imposing strict regulations on businesses and Gurria called for steps to be taken to ensure fair competition and competitive pricing. New suppliers must not be priced out of the market, the OECD chief said.

Unemployment among the nation's youth was estimated at about 50 percent. Though overall unemployment declined since 2002, it had never fallen below 20 percent and in the first quarter of this year it stood at between 25 and 30 percent.

The body, a world economic and development research organization, commended South Africa for expanding social programs for the poor, but cautioned against spending too much on it. More than 12 million poor South Africans are receiving government-sponsored social grants.

The report said South Africa massively expanded its spending on social programs in recent years to ease poverty but "moving too far in this direction" could jeopardize fiscal stability and hinder market-driven growth.

Source: Associated Press (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gavxSvNiW2HU8c5yZGz1o-Hv3m1gD9H27UI01)

Why does South Africa see chicken growth like 4%? Why can't it see real growth at 10-15%?

If you hate the ANC, then you hate South Africa. I hope you get stomach cancer and die.

mmmmmmmm

Gauteng and W Cape still draw thousands looking for work

Gauteng still tops the list of provinces with the best perceived job prospects, with the Western Cape a close second.

The latest mid-year population figures released by Stats SA show between them the provinces have the highest influx of migrants, at just under 460,000 people every five years.

Gauteng also has the largest population count in the country with about 11 million people.

Stats SA’s Kefiloe Maseteng said many flock to the two provinces hoping for a better life.

“People make choices to move to what’s more urban and more developed areas in a particular country, they seem to be the provinces that are having a pull effect on the movement of people.”

She also added the gender ratio in the country, which is historically dominated by women, appears to be evening out.

“Even that sex ratio is not very far off - 51 as compared to 49 - so here it’s very close to 50/50 in terms of comprising of men and women in the country.”

Starwood Hotels eyes Africa for expansion
http://af.reuters.com/resources/r/?m=02&d=20100727&t=2&i=164919413&w=&fh=&fw=&ll=192&pl=155&r=2010-07-27T152229Z_01_AJOE66Q16PJ00_RTROPTP_0_OZABS-STARWOOD-AFRICA-20100727

Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide plans to expand in South Africa, the continent's largest economy, and is eyeing African frontier markets for future growth, a top executive said on Tuesday.

U.S.-based Starwood, whose portfolio includes Le Meridien, Westin, W Hotels, Sheraton and others, faces stiff competition in South Africa, especially after operators added rooms for the country's hosting of the soccer World Cup, which ended this month.

"We have nine brands under the Starwood umbrella and would like to see multiple brands in both Cape Town and Johannesburg, where we don't have any current presence, with our nearest hotel in Pretoria," Patrick Finn, a senior director of acquisitions and development for Africa and the Middle East, told Reuters in an interview.

Starwood would like to see two to three newly constructed hotels under management in Cape Town and another three to four in Johannesburg in the medium term, he said on the sidelines of an African hotel investment conference.

"The target would be signing up these projects in the very near term with opening dates that are two to three years out," he said.

Finn said Starwood was also looking to expand in East Africa, specifically in regional economic power Kenya, and Tanzania, where it was eyeing game park-themed hotels.

Angola, one of Africa's top oil producers, was a key future destination, although the soaring property prices in capital Luanda, remained a challenge for operators and investors.

Starwood reported a higher-than-expected profit last week and said the rebound in business demand should allow the hotelier to command higher room rates this year.

Lephalale property gets industry boost
28 Jul 2010

Unprecedented industry growth in the energy sector is luring a mix of buyers to Lephalale (Ellisras) in Limpopo.

Margarita Geyser, Broker/Owner of RE/MAX Adventure Properties, says there is a true mix of buyers, which comprise mostly contractors that are “semigrating” from all over South Africa and bringing their families with them. “Most of the buyers are selling up their homes, moving to Lephalale and buying new homes in the area. I would say that approximately 90% of these buyers work for either Exxaro or Eskom, and that the remaining 10% comprise private entrepreneurs or business people.”

Geyser says Lephalale is currently home to the world’s largest dry-cooled power station, Matimba, as well as the world’s largest open cast coal mine, Grootgeluk. She says the World Bank’s multi-billion rand loan to Eskom that was approved earlier this year has ensured the development of the Madupi Power Station, which is currently in the process of being built.

She notes that Lephalale is also a hotbed of other new industrial developments as well. “Another mine, the Exxaro Coal Mine, is expanding to the tune of R9,5bn, the construction of another brand new coal mine, Boikarabelo, is in the pipeline and is set to begin early next year, and Eskom is busy with Environmental Impact Assessments on the possibility of building a further three new power stations as well as the possibility of developing a coal-to-liquids plant for Sasol.”

And of course, with all this new development, comes an influx of new residents and an increased demand for housing and various lifestyle amenities. “At this stage, Lephalale has about 45 000 people living in the town. By 2016, the town population is expected to increase to 100 000 people, and by 2030, the population is estimated to be in excess of 200 000. Obviously, this is a great prospect for real estate in the area.”

The price of an average entry-level, newly built, two-bedroom home in Ellisras ranges between R600k and R1,3m. Prices of mid-level homes, which are usually situated on a stand of approximately 1,000sqm and measure around 150sqm under roof, range between the R850k and the R1,6m mark. Homes at the upper-end of the market begin selling at around R1,7m.

Assis Pontes, area principal for Pam Golding Properties (PGP) in Lephalale, says he is seeing big demand for sectional title units ranging in the R670k mark. “These mostly have two bedrooms with two bathrooms, and various other formations. Investors from Durban, Cape Town, Prieska in the Karoo and Mossel Bay have been keen buyers.

“Entrepreneurs moving to Lephalale are buying, thanks to the growth projects such as Medupi and the Exxaro expansion, and many want to be positioned for growth.”

According to Geyser current residents are cashing in on the increased demand for real estate by sub-dividing their properties and either selling the land or building a house or flat on it and letting it.

Obviously, along with the increase in demand for residential property, Geyser says that there will be a lot of development with regards to lifestyle amenities in the area. “A new R600m shopping centre is currently being developed and is set to open its doors in September next year. Located on a 12ha site in Onverwacht, adjacent to the existing town centre, the development includes a 42,000sqm shopping centre. In a linked project, developers plan to build a 17,000sqm office park adjacent to the shopping centre as well.”

Pontes says rentals are driven by corporates in Lephalale and quality homes that offer lifestyle are always sought-after. “A well-appointed four bedroom home with pool on the golf-course will rent for up to R11k per month. Though rentals have adjusted to market conditions a two-bedroom unit will fetch a rental of R6,500 per month.” – Eugene Brink

South African business magazine the best in the world

South African glossy business-to-business magazine Leadership has been named the best in the world in the annual Tabbie awards presented by the US-based Trade Association Business Publications International (Tabpi), an association of more than 100 publishing houses.

The magazine won the 2010 gold award in the best single issue category, which Tabpi describes as "the competition's most comprehensive, in a contest which attracted more then 500 nominations from the US, Canada, the UK, India, New Zealand and South Africa.

"Leadership’s overall quality is exemplary," the judges said. "The writing is top notch, and it is easy to see how it is immediately useful to its target audience. The reporting is balanced and evolves from a wide range of writers who are knowledgeable in their subject matter. The columns and viewpoints are engaging and relevant to the magazine’s audience.

"Overall, the magazine is a delight for the eyes and the mind, which are qualities not often found in the same publication."

The winning issue was Leadership's 300th edition, published in December 2009.

In accepting the award, Leadership editor Robbie Stammers said: "We feel very privileged. The team works very hard and to be recognised by our peers at this level is very satisfying."

Leadership is the flagship in the list of business magazines published in Cape Town by Cape Media Corporation. "It is good to see that South Africa can lead the way even in such a highly competitive industry as ours," said managing director Robert Arendse.

The top 10 winners are:

1 Leadership (gold) – South Africa

2 Indesign (silver) – US

3 Architect (bronze) – US

4 Engineering and Technology – UK

5 Move – US

6 Buildings – US

7 The Conference Board Review – US

8 Construction World – India

9 Educause Review – US

10 Exhibitor Magazine – US

SOUTH AFRICA NEEDS FAVOURABLE ENVIRONMENT FOR INVESTMENT
PRETORIA, Aug 21 (NNN-BUANEWS) -- Although South Africa's economy is well into a modest recovery it must create an environment that is favourable to domestic and foreign investment, says Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan.

"The South African economy is well into modest recovery. Economic growth came in at 4.6 percent during the first quarter of this year and growth for the second quarter is expected to be at least 3 percent," said Gordhan at the launch of the Land Bank's annual report.

What is crucial in South Africa, he said, is inclusive economic growth, growth that creates jobs, reduces poverty and creates opportunities especially for the youth. It also generates taxes with which public services like education are paid for.

"It is therefore important that we remain focused on getting South Africa's economy on a higher and much more sustainable growth trajectory. If we are to grow faster we must create an environment that is favourable to domestic and foreign investment," he said.

The cost of doing business in South Africa must be lowered while red tape must be cut while quality public services must be rendered to the public, the minister said.

"We must increase competition between firms, a serious challenge in South Africa; lower barriers to entry in the economy; support innovation and above all increase exports."

If South Africans are intent on a prosperous and sustainable future then the country should set its sights for growth at 7 percent a year over the next 20-30 years.

"All we've achieved is about 5 percent. How do we grow this economy at 7 percent over the next 20 to 30 years is a crucial challenge all of us face for the next year or so.

"We must also develop new ways of thinking about economic growth, and the role of the agricultural sector in economic growth, and the willingness to do things differently," said Gordhan. http://namnewsnetwork.org/v2/read.php?id=130891

Old Mutual confirms HSBC bid for control of Nedbank
REUTERS
Published: 2010/08/23 08:05:51 AM

HSBC will buy up to 70 percent of Nedbank , in a potential $6.8 billion deal that would give Europe's largest lender a presence in Africa's largest economy and a gateway to the fast-growing continent.

HSBC and Anglo-South African insurer Old Mutual , which owns a controlling stake in Nedbank, said in separate statements on Monday they were in exclusive talks about the deal.

Old Mutual said HSBC could acquire up to 70 percent of South Africa's fourth-largest bank, a deal that could be worth about R49.9 billion ($6.84 billion), given Nedbank's current market value.

Old Mutual is undergoing a strategic overhaul to slim down its complicated structure.

Nedbank said in a statement that HSBC was an attractive international banking partner.

Nedbank this month posted flat first-half earnings and said it would struggle to meet its medium-term forecasts, hurt by its money-losing retail unit.

- http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=118815

One giant leap closer to massive telescope By John Yeld

South Africa's proud reputation for scientific excellence has been further enhanced by the world astronomical community's decision to base its new, well-funded 10-year programme to foster and promote astronomy in the developing world in this country.

The International Astronomical Union (IAU), the premier international organisation of the world's professional astronomers with nearly 10 000 members, recently signed a formal agreement with the South African government to host its new Global Astronomy for Development Office in the Cape Town suburb of Observatory.

The office, which will co-ordinate a wide range of activities as part of the pioneering 10-year plan to exploit astronomy in boosting education and capacity building in the developing world, will be based at the SA Astronomical Observatory (SAAO).

The decision to create the new office was taken during the highly successful IAU/Unesco-sponsored International Year of Astronomy, IYA 2009, which commemorated the 400th anniversary of Galileo's discoveries with a telescope that fundamentally changed people's perceptions of the universe.

At its three-yearly General Assembly in Rio de Janeiro in August, the astronomical union approved a strategic plan for education and development that had been formulated by members during the previous two years.

"(IYA 2009) motivated the IAU to commit to even more ambitious programmes of educating the world to the beauty of the universe and the sense of common humanity that derives from it," explained IAU vice-president for development and education Professor George Miley.

The strategic plan proposed a range of programmes that would "stimulate the development of a generation of youth who will become the science and technology leaders of their countries in future years", he said.

"Astronomy is a unique and cost-effective tool for furthering sustainable global development, because of its technological scientific and cultural dimensions. (The strategic plan) shows how astronomy can contribute globally to education at the primary, secondary and tertiary levels and can enable less developed, poorer countries to participate in cutting-edge scientific research."

One of the programmes in this strategic plan is to use astronomy to help promote developing countries, hence the new Global Astronomy for Development Office.

South Africa's successful bid to host this office - which comes at the same time as its competition with Australia to host the massive Square Kilometre Array radio telescope project hots up - was made in the face of stiff competition from 37 competing expressions of interests and came after an extremely strict and impartial adjudication process, according to Kevin Govender of the SAAO.

Govender, who chairs the IAU's Developing Astronomy Globally programme and who was co-author of South Africa's proposal for the new office, described the decision as important for the prestige of South Africa and Africa.

"This has really huge potential, and we had 60 or 70 congratulatory e-mails from all over Africa as soon as the announcement was made," he said.

"It has really boosted everyone's spirits because now we can say Africa is co-ordinating development, whereas previously it has always been the recipient.

"Now, Africans are doing it for themselves.

"We're driving a unique project here with huge potential, and the other scientific disciplines are watching closely because it's a model that can easily be replicated."

The rationale for using astronomy to stimulate sustainable international development is that astronomy provides an inspirational and unique gateway to technology, science and culture, according t o the IAU.

Astronomy can play a unique role in facilitating education and capacity building and in furthering sustainable development throughout the world because it combines science and technology with inspiration and excitement.

Astronomy can inspire teenagers to choose a career in science and technology and is a staple of adult education.

"A challenging science in itself, astronomy provides an exciting gateway into physics, chemistry, biology and mathematics.

"The need to study the faintest celestial objects has driven advanced developments in electronics, optics and information technology.

"The quest to explore the universe satisfies the deepest cultural and philosophical yearnings of our species and can stimulate a sense of global citizenship.

"The IAU regards access to knowledge about the universe as a birthright of all people, and furthering the exploitation of astronomy for sustainable global development as an important part of its mission."

Govender said an advertisement for the critically important post of director of the new programme had gone out almost immediately after the agreement had been signed, and that a candidate would be selected after the end of next month.

"The idea is to get this office going as soon as possible, before the end of the year," he said.






This article was originally published on page 6 of The Pretoria News (http://www.pretorianews.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=5625869) on August 31, 2010

http://www.iol.co.za/data/mastheads/mast_108.gif (http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=1916)

JAPANESE DELEGATION VISITING SOUTH AFRICA TO STRENGTHEN TIES
PRETORIA, Sept 1 (NNN-BUANEWS) -- A delegation of Japanese government and business representatives has arrived here to hold talks with South African representatives in a move to strengthen ties amidst a growing global competition for rare metals and other resources in the continent.

South Africa's International Relations and Co-operation Deputy Minister, Sue Van Der Merwe, will chair the meeting between the South African delegations and a Japanese delegation led by her counterpart, Osamu Fujimura, in Cape Town on Wednesday.

For South Africa, which is rich in gold, platinum and rare earths, Japan is eyeing expanding exports to the country related to the construction of infrastructure in various fields such as transport equipment.

"The purpose of the visit is to investigate opportunities in the areas of trade and investment within infrastructural development projects in the energy and transport sectors," International Relations and Co-operation Department Spokesman Saul Molobi said here Tuesday.

The high level delegation also includes Japanese Vice-Minister of Economy Chiaki Takahashi as well as business representatives from various companies such as Toyota, Hitachi, Sumitomo, Mitsubishi, Nippon Export and Investment Insurance.

Currently there are about 86 Japanese companies operating in South Africa and Japan was the biggest export market for South Africa in 2005, 2006 and 2008. However, following the latest global recession, Japan dropped to third position in 2009.

Trade between the two countries is expected to recover from 2010. Two-way trade amounted to 107 billion Rand in 2008 with South Africa enjoying a trade surplus of 25 billion Rand.

The two countries share deep and fruitful bilateral relations in various fields, including investments, science and technology, public administration, education, business, sports and recreation among others.

More than 1,200 South Africans have been trained in various training courses in Japan.
The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) currently despatches more than 20 experts and volunteers to South Africa, to train government officials in various fields such as mathematics and science teachers and artisans.

This year marks the 100th year since the establishment of an official contact between South Africa and Japan with the appointment of an Honorary Consul of Japan, Sir Julius Jeppe, in Cape Town in 1910.

According to Molobi, programmes of events have been organised in both South Africa and Japan to promote people-to-people contacts and a better understanding of the two countries' respective cultures.http://namnewsnetwork.org/v2/read.php?id=131865

SA's currency is a bit high to stay competitive in the world (atleast for a developing country).

Question: Instead of Government wanting to tax the rand (which is not good for direct foreign investment), Why don't they keep more foreign reserves or even buy more? This can keep the currency down and keep it stable. This will also keep inflation down I think, since the supply of money will not increase?!

SA slides in competitiveness rankings
Sep 09 2010


Johannesburg - South Africa has fallen nine places in the latest global competitiveness rankings - from 45th place last year to 54th this year - but remains the highest ranked country in sub-Saharan Africa.

The World Economic Forum, in its Global Competitiveness Report for 2010 and 2011, said that while the country has dropped somewhat in rank since last year, its performance has remained stable and that the decline reflected improvements in other countries.

Switzerland tops the overall rankings, while the US falls two places to fourth position, overtaken by Sweden (2nd) and Singapore (3rd), after already ceding the top place to Switzerland last year.

"In addition to the macroeconomic imbalances that have been building up over time, there has been a weakening of United States' public and private institutions, as well as lingering concerns about the state of its financial markets," the World Economic Forum said in the report.

Nordic countries continue to be well positioned in the ranking, with Sweden, Finland (7th) and Denmark (9th) among the top 10, and with Norway at 14th.

Sweden overtook the US and Singapore this year to be placed 2nd overall. The UK, after falling in the rankings over recent years, moved back up by one place to 12th position.

Several countries from the Middle East and North Africa region occupy the upper half of the rankings, led by Qatar (17th), Saudi Arabia (21st), Israel (24th), United Arab Emirates (25th), Tunisia (32nd), Kuwait (35th) and Bahrain (37th), with most Gulf States continuing their upward trend of recent years.

In sub-Saharan Africa, South Africa (54th) and Mauritius (55th) featured in the top half of the rankings, followed by second-tier best regional performers Namibia (74th), Botswana (76th) and Rwanda (80th).

Questions over sustainability

The report said that Africa has experienced impressive growth over the past decade, and has weathered the recent global economic turmoil relatively well.

Indeed, coming out of the crisis, the International Monetary Fund predicts gross domestic product (GDP) growth of 4.7% in 2010 and well above 5% for the next few years for sub-Saharan Africa.

"Yet an assessment of the competitiveness of African economies raises questions about how sustainable this growth will be over the longer term and highlights areas in need of urgent attention to allow Africa to achieve its full economic potential," the report states.

"However, despite such concerns, some African countries continue to fare quite well. South Africa and Mauritius remain in the top half of the rankings, and there have been measurable improvements across specific areas in a number of other African countries."

"On the other hand, there have been some significant declines registered in countries that were previously making strides ahead. More generally, sub-Saharan Africa as a whole lags behind the rest of the world in competitiveness, requiring efforts across many areas to place the region on a firmly sustainable growth and development path going forward," the report said.

A huge tenant called Teletech just gave us notice that they are shutting shop this year and moving operations to Asia - this puts around 2000 Cape Townians out of work...eish. They sited problems like uncompetitive wages, running costs and a very unproductive workforce.

Johannesburg - South African farmers have received new land offers to grow crops across Africa, bringing the total number of countries offering farming opportunities to 22, a major farmers' group said on Friday.

South Africa - the continent's biggest economy - has one of the most developed agricultural sectors on the continent and its farmers are looking to expand into other countries.

Farmers group Agri SA said there had been growing interest from other African countries for South African farmers to invest in those nations.

"Namibia has become the 22nd country to invite Agri SA to establish irrigation (farms) along the banks of the Orange and Kunene Rivers," Agri SA deputy president Theo de Jager said in a statement.

"Last week Gabon made a presentation to Agri SA's Africa committee, while the contracts between South African farmers and the Republic of Congo should soon be finalised."

Agri SA said more than 1 000 South African farmers are already producing crops in Mozambique, Botswana, Malawi, Zambia and Kenya.

South African farmers have in the recent past also received land offers from countries like Uganda, Angola and Libya.

But lack of bilateral agreements between South Africa and some countries had discouraged farmers from investing in certain places.

The grouping said it would carefully scrutinise bilateral agreements between South Africa and potential host countries before making investments.

"It is becoming increasingly important to manage the impact that large-scale production of certain commodities in our neighbouring states can have on local markets," De Jager said.

Agri SA said it would help South African farmers to secure financing from local and international sources for their investments.

Agri SA said in July that financiers like Standard Bank Group [JSE:SBK], Absa Group [JSE:ASA] and Standard Chartered had shown interest to fund land buys and that the Chinese have been talking with South African farmers to finance their cross-border investments.
Source:http://www.fin24.com/Economy/SA-farmers-offered-more-land-in-Africa-20100917

Big business fleshes out 2040 ‘developed country' vision
By: Terence Creamer
23rd September 2010

Big business in South Africa is beginning to add flesh to its vision for transitioning the country from a developing to developed one by 2040, which would involve, among other things, raising per capita income from $10 000 to $30 000 a year - the average level achieved by Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) members.

Business Leadership South Africa (BLSA) chairperson Bobby Godsell reports that 53 of its 80 members have submitted inputs on how their businesses could double, or treble, in size over the coming three decades and how South Africa could do likewise. BLSA comprises the largest 50 listed companies on the JSE, as well as multinationals, large black economic-empowerment enterprises and the leading State-owned enterprises

Speaking at the Swiss-South Africa Chamber of Commerce on Thursday, Godsell stressed that the information was still being complied and that further associated studies were also yet to be completed. However, three key themes had already emerged.

The first, related to the need to find new customers beyond the relatively limited market of 50-million South Africans, some 10-million of which were considered to have considerable buying power.

Broadening that market to the countries of the Southern African Development Community and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, which together comprised 500-million people and an economy with a combined gross domestic product of $800-million, could be reduce the threat of market saturation.

But power, transport and communications infrastructure would have to be dramatically improved, and governments would need to pursue to policies that fostered a more seamless movement of goods, services, capital and people within the region.

Secondly, the skills development and education systems in South Africa would have to be aligned to the economic needs of the country and the continent.

In fact, Godsell suggests that the educational system should make a break from its current bias of preparing scholars for university, to embrace vocational streams that prepare students for technical careers.

This would require improving the teaching of mathematics and creating space to enable artisans to gain workplace experience. Further, the status of teachers would have to be materially improved so as to attract a higher calibre of individual to the profession.

The third pillar, of what Godsell described as a "new dream" for South Africa, would be to cultivate a culture of effective regulation, whereby the rules are transparent and consistently applied.

In other words fashioned in the US vision of a "country of laws, not a country of men". In such as context, corruption and the ability to trade on political influence would be severely constrained.

"Part of the dream, is for South Africa to become the Japan of the African continent and change the world's concept of Africa," Godsell reflected, noting that, despite Japan's current problems, it had been able to "completely change its character and its place in the world's mindset".

"I think South Africa is perfectly capable of doing the same," he concluded.



Edited by: Creamer Media Reporter
Source:http://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/big-business-fleshes-out-2040-developed-country-vision-2010-09-23

"Big business in South Africa is beginning to add flesh to its vision for transitioning the country from a developing to developed one by 2040"

------------------------------------------------------------------
gosh, 2040 is a long way. why not 2020? :)

If South Africa can become a developed nation by 2040, it will have to go through economic growth rate of 5-10%.

^^ SA should aim for at least 7% growth rate. 5% is slow for a developing nation, not to mention one with a growing population.

And per capita of $30K by 2040, that really isn't such a huge increase. That is only a $20K increase over the next 30 years.That would mean about a $600-$675 dollar increase in come every year, if I'm right. Not bad, but I've seen predictions that put nations far less developed than SA w/ higher gdp per capita than $30K by then. In my opinion, the target should be $40K by 2040. 3 decades to raise per capita by $30,000. It's possible.

U.S. Investors 'Concerned Over Calls to Nationalise' (http://allafrica.com/stories/201010150219.html)Johannesburg — A SENIOR US government official yesterday warned against attempts to nationalise SA's mines.

William Fitzgerald, deputy assistant secretary of state for African affairs, spoke in Sandton where he met US economic and commercial officers posted in Africa.

"I certainly think that American investors are very concerned when there's talk about nationalisation," Mr Fitzgerald said.

"Over the past 30 years what we have seen around the world, when a country nationalises its industries, is that those industries tend to become in efficient," he said. "You only need to look at other African countries in the southern hemisphere to see that nationalisation has largely led to greater unemployment and lack of competitiveness."

The African National Congress (ANC) Youth League is on a quest to make nationalisation official government policy. The league has even threatened to unseat leaders of the party at its elective conference in 2012 if they did not support its call.

President Jacob Zuma and senior members of the Cabinet have maintained that nationalisation is not government policy. However, the ANC has instructed its national executive committee to investigate and draw up a report on the practicality of state intervention in the economy, including nationalisation.

Mr Fitzgerald said more American companies were interested in investing in SA. A recent case was retailer Wal-Mart's offer of 4,6bn to buy SA's Massmart Holdings.

About 500 US enterprises are operating in SA, he said.

SA is one of 38 African countries that export products quota and duty-free under the US-initiated Africa Growth and Opportunity Act.

Mr Fitzgerald said the US would be willing to assist African governments to formulate measures for reducing trade barriers.

Reserve Bank May Cut Rates 'If Rand Continues Ascent' (http://allafrica.com/stories/201010150679.html)Johannesburg — THE Reserve Bank sent a veiled hint yesterday that appreciation in the rand, and the "risk" it poses to the inflation outlook, could prompt it to consider another cut in interest rates.

In a biannual monetary policy review, the Bank emphasised several times that the main "downside risk" to the inflation outlook is the exchange rate of the rand, which has rocketed in response to global capital inflows.

Brian Kahn, a senior member of the monetary policy committee, said the Bank could make a policy decision based solely on changes to the risks affecting inflation, without even altering its forecasts. "Even if the forecast remains the same, we could come to a different policy decision depending on whether we see an upside risk or a downside risk," he said.

Mr Kahn was replying to a question at the presentation of the published review.

His answer was significant as the Bank repeatedly said in its review that the exchange rate of the rand is the main "downside risk" to its latest forecasts.

Some analysts have said sustained rand strength will lead to lower inflation than anticipated, giving the Bank scope to trim rates again early next year.

The rand scaled a new 33- month peak at R6,76/$ yesterday, bringing its gains against a trade- weighted basket of currencies this year to nearly 7%.

It was above R7/$ at the Bank's policy meeting last month, when the monetary policy committee decided to trim the repo rate by half a percentage point to 6%.

Gains in the rand erode the global competitiveness of exports, but also reduce the cost of imports, helping to curb inflation.

In its review, the Bank emphasised that the rand has been affected "significantly" by capital inflows to emerging markets, due to low interest rates in advanced economies, it said.

Like many emerging market currencies, the rand has appreciated to disturbingly strong levels on surging capital inflows prompted by global investors searching for higher yields.

Interest rates in major developed countries are next to zero as authorities try to boost flagging growth.

"These pressures are likely to persist as long as monetary policy remains extremely accomodative in these countries," the Bank said.

The Bank's governor, Gill Marcus, said that the level of the rand is "a concern" and discussions are under way with the Treasury to come up with possible solutions to curb its strength.

But she made clear that the Bank is still not targeting a specific level for the currency, and it would be a mistake to adopt a fixed exchange rate, based on the experience of other countries. Ms Marcus said there is "no reason" to alter the official 3%-6% inflation target, which is broad by global standards.

The Bank sees inflation at an average 4,8% next year, rising to 5,1% by the end of the year. But inflation has consistently fallen below expectations in the past few months, rising 3,5% in August - a five-year low.

The Bank said that at its policy meeting last month, the monetary policy committee saw its interest rate stance after the cut as "appropriate" for the current environment.

But it said: "This view is conditional upon no significant changes in the variables that impact on inflation."

The Bank said the recovery in the global economy is "hesitant and uneven", with "elevated downside risk". SA's growth outlook remains subdued and unemployment remains high, it said.

The effect of the World Cup is still unclear, raising doubt about the sustainability of spending, especially given weak credit growth.

Growth in private sector investment is also lagging and seen as a "constraint on growth".

On the other hand, one of the main "upside risks" to the Bank's inflation forecast is wage settlements above inflation, it said. According to an Andrew Levy employment expectations survey, the average level of wage settlements in SA's economy fell from 8,4% in the first quarter of this year to 8,2% in the second quarter, the Bank said.

This compares with an average increase of 9,3% last year. But labour productivity between the first and second quarters fell to 4,6% from 5%. This pushed nominal unit labour costs, an important inflation indicator, up to 10,8% in the second quarter from 10,2% in the first quarter, the Bank said

Exactly as I predicted in an earlier post:

http://www.miningmx.com/news/markets/Mine-nationalisation-will-cost-taxpayers.htm


Nationalisation 'will cost taxpayers'

NATIONALISED mines would have cost South African taxpayers R67bn in 2009, outgoing Chamber of Mines (COM) president and Exxaro Resources CEO Sipho Nkosi said on Tuesday.
“It is worth pointing out to the proponents of nationalisation that mines operate in a tough global environment which is not about the enormous accumulation of wealth,” Nkosi said at the COM annual general meeting.
“It is a difficult industry. Nationalisation has never been a successful enduring business anywhere and has impoverished many countries.”
He said the total income of the country’s mining sector in 2009 amounted to R332bn. Total expenditure, including taxes, dividends and capital expenditure amounted to R399bn, representing a R67bn deficit. If taxes, dividends and capex were to be excluded, the industry would have posted a gross surplus of R20bn.
Nkosi welcomed the fact that both President Jacob Zuma and Mining Minister Susan Shabangu have stated publicly that nationalisation is not government policy.
He said while the issue remained as an agenda item for the ANC’s national conference in 2012, the chamber would participate “vigorously and constructively” at any public debate that might take place on the issue.

US group to buy Cell C towers for $430m

Mobile operator Cell C will sell up to 3 200 of its existing and future base stations, or towers, to American Tower Corporation for $430-million.

The parties have entered into a definitive agreement for the sale of the towers, which it expected to be completed by early next year.

Cell C would be the anchor tenant on each of the 1 400 existing towers, as well as up to another 1 800 towers that were under construction or would be built in the next two years.

“This is an important strategic transaction for Cell C, allowing us to realise the value embedded in our passive infrastructure, which has undergone a significant transformation over the past few years. We believe our relationship with American Tower will enable us to further enhance the quality and coverage of our network,” CEO Lars Reichelt said.

American Tower chairperson and CEO Jim Taiclet added that South Africa was a compelling investment opportunity and that the country would provide it with a platform for future growth in the African region.

The independent owner, operator and developer of about 33 000 broadcast and wireless communications sites across the US, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, India, Mexico and Peru, leases antennae sites on the towers to multiple tenants.

Infrastructure sharing, or tower sharing, among telecommunications operators was becoming more prevalent across the world, as it allowed mobile operators to save on operational costs and expand their reach.

US group to buy Cell C towers for $430m

Mobile operator Cell C will sell up to 3 200 of its existing and future base stations, or towers, to American Tower Corporation for $430-million.

The parties have entered into a definitive agreement for the sale of the towers, which it expected to be completed by early next year.

Cell C would be the anchor tenant on each of the 1 400 existing towers, as well as up to another 1 800 towers that were under construction or would be built in the next two years.

“This is an important strategic transaction for Cell C, allowing us to realise the value embedded in our passive infrastructure, which has undergone a significant transformation over the past few years. We believe our relationship with American Tower will enable us to further enhance the quality and coverage of our network,” CEO Lars Reichelt said.

American Tower chairperson and CEO Jim Taiclet added that South Africa was a compelling investment opportunity and that the country would provide it with a platform for future growth in the African region.

The independent owner, operator and developer of about 33 000 broadcast and wireless communications sites across the US, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, India, Mexico and Peru, leases antennae sites on the towers to multiple tenants.

Infrastructure sharing, or tower sharing, among telecommunications operators was becoming more prevalent across the world, as it allowed mobile operators to save on operational costs and expand their reach.

What I've been saying elsewhere. People are bloody lazy and the culture of dependency will only continue.

The dangers of dependency

Jack Bloom
08 November 2010

Jack Bloom says South Africans should be helped to help themselves

HELPING PEOPLE TO HELP THEMSELVES
Do we need an alternative term for "service delivery"? I think so, and so does new Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini.
At the ANC's recent National General Council meeting she said that the term should be stopped as it inculcated a sense of entitlement among people. "(It) makes people believe that they will get everything from government", she said.
She added: "South Africans were mobilised people before 1994. They were hard workers but that has changed. They don't contribute anything. They destroy what they have when they demand something."
This is a refreshing acknowledgement of the dangers of dependency on government hand-outs. Let's start with housing, where we have a fairly insane give-away of a major asset that is often not even recipients' highest priority.
This is why, as ANC delegates also observed, they often sell or rent out these houses and go back to informal settlements. Housing waiting lists are always contentious and thoroughly corrupted. There are umpteen stories about people on lists since the mid-90s who still don't have a house while others jump the queue through bribes or political connections.
The RDP houses are typically small and uniform, with little choice given to recipients. They are often built badly, due to corrupt contractors. According to Human Settlements Minister Tokyo Sexwale, 40 000 houses countrywide have to be rebuilt at a cost of R1.3 billion. Building vouchers and/or tax breaks for small builders could have achieved far more, including choice and variety.
Informal settlements could have been upgraded in this way too. This would have been real empowerment of the masses, tapping into the creativity and energy of everyone.
The irony of the "open toilets" saga in Cape Town is that with community consultation it stretched the available money for sanitation. The deal was that instead of one enclosed toilet for every five families, each household would get a toilet that they undertook to enclose themselves.
Residents made all manner of arrangements to do this, including some ingenious en suite variations. Only 55 remained unenclosed out of 1316 toilets, and these residents still had access to the national norm of one communal toilet per five households. The ANC's hypocrisy in distorting this to score points against the DA has unfortunately put paid to similar exercises elsewhere.
Another source of damaging dependency is the grants given without any conditions. This is in contrast to Brazil's successful Bolsa Familia cash transfer programme. Money is given to poor women on condition that they send their children to schools and have them vaccinated.
Pregnant women get it on condition they see a doctor during pregnancy. According to Brazil's Deputy Minister for Social Security, Carlos Gabas: "Bolsa Familia not only helps to lift people out of poverty, it also helps them to enter the labour market. A person who has enough to eat, to dress and to have a decent life is in a better position to look for a job than one who is starving."
This is a perfect expression of the need for a "hand up" rather than endless hand-outs. It is social assistance rather than service delivery. The truly incapacitated or vulnerable must have a safety net, but those who can lift themselves up must get the opportunity.
This article by Jack Bloom, DA member of the Gauteng Legislature, first appeared in The Citizen (http://www.thecitizen.co.za/).
Click here (http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71674) to sign up to receive our free daily headline email newsletter

China wants SA red tape sorted out
Nov 17 2010

Cape Town - Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping began a trip to mineral-rich South Africa on Tuesday aimed at securing resources for the Asian economic power, looking to extend its influence in the African continent.

Beijing sees global mining power and regional financial services leader South Africa as a vital source of commodities to fuel its rapidly expanding economy and industries and as a stepping stone to access other African states.

Xi, pegged as China's next president, is on a three-day official visit to Africa's largest economy, which exports about $5.5bn a year in minerals to the state and has been increasingly a destination of Chinese foreign direct investment.

"As the international landscape evolves and China-South Africa cooperation deepens, the need for our bilateral cooperation is growing, the areas of cooperation are expanding and a confluence of our interests is increasing," Xi said on Tuesday.

The Chinese delegation and South Africa are expected on Wednesday to sign a bilateral memorandum of understanding for co-operation in geology and mining, and a letter of intent related to South Africa's energy sector, among others.

"It makes sense that China's political diplomacy marries that desire to reshape the world with Africa's participation," Jeremy Stevens, an economist at Standard Bank told Reuters.

Standard Bank Group [JSE:SBK], the largest on the continent is 20 percent owned by the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, in an arrangement analysts felt could foster increased Chinese investment in the continent but has yet to yield big dividends.

Not fully leveraged

Chinese investors are frustrated with a South African bureaucracy seen as more cumbersome than other major mining countries like Australia.

Implementing resource deals that include infrastructure investments to unlock commodity delivery bottlenecks are also of concern, an expert on China-Africa relations said.

"We don't get to fully leverage the opportunities that China presents us, from an investment perspective, a trade perspective and a market access perspective," said Martyn Davies, CEO of Johannesburg-based Frontier Advisory.

China is South Africa's biggest bilateral trading partner and the focal point of its plan to divert more trade and investment from traditional markets in Europe and North America to the world's fastest growing economies.

"We look forward to more work tomorrow and I am confident that before you leave our country on the 18th we shall have achieved work that would ordinarily be achieved in five years," South African deputy president, Kgalema Mothlanthe, said on Tuesday.

But China also serves as a model of state action in the economy, with Pretoria hoping to join it in the Bric - Brazil, Russia, India and China - group of fast-emerging economies.

But a "Bricsa" grouping seems unlikely for now with South Africa growth projected at 3% this year, hardly the blistering pace of other members. Its economy is also less than a quarter of the size of the smallest Bric economy.

Xi next travels to oil-rich Angola and Botswana in visits seen as helping China's energy and resources security.

China's mineral diplomacy has been criticised for its secrecy and bolstering a few governments that Western states accuse of human rights violations.

World Bank Managing Director Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said Chinese companies eyeing African mineral resources must stop making closed-door deals and become more transparent in their investments.

President Jacob Zuma visited China in August, seeking to increase bilateral financial flows.

Mercedes-Benz to invest R2bn in East London plant
ROY DOWNING
Published: 2010/12/07 12:00:34 PM

http://www.businessday.co.za/toolpages/thumbnail.aspx?id=388955&type=img

Mercedes-Benz South Africa received confirmation on Tuesday of a new R2bn investment in its East London plant, according to a statement released by the company.

This investment is part of the company’s plans to manufacture their new C-Class model, which will be introduced into the market by 2014.

Daimler AG Board of Management member, Dr Wolfgang Bernhard, said he is delighted to include South Africa among the four manufacturers producing the new C-Class.

"The Mercedes-Benz plant in East London has been recognised repeatedly for its excellent production quality by JD Power and Associates and is one of the best manufacturing plants in the industry," he said.

"This success is not least due to the great efforts of the East London plant’s team and its stringent application of the Mercedes-Benz production system with its robust processes and rigorous quality standards."

The three other Mercedes-Benz plants selected to produce the next-generation C-Class are located in Germany, China and the USA.

Dr. Hansgeorg Niefer, CEO of Mercedes-Benz SA, believes this is a vote of confidence in the South African operations. "We have had immense success in South Africa with the C-Class, and we have exported to left-hand drive markets since 1998 and to right-hand drive markets since 2000."

"Today is very special, as we can now go full steam ahead with our preparations to build the next generation of this successful Mercedes-Benz model. Just recently we exported the 100 000th C-Class built in East London. In the first quarter of next year we should reach the half-a-million mark of C-Class vehicles produced locally since 1994, which marked the model’s start of production in South Africa," he added.

- http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=128804

Guess our government's scheme is working as this follows annoucements of multi-billion investments by WV and GM SA as well, so our autoindustry is booming! :banana:

Government wants to boost production numbers to 1.2 million units by 2020. :cheers:

Gearing for growth in a changing world
John Battersby

Share | 9 December 2010

A group of 20 international journalists got a close-up view of South African transport and energy infrastructure, and heard first-hand about the country's growth plans, during a week-long visit to the country. John Battersby reports.

The world is changing and South Africa will look increasingly to more integrated African markets and the new economic powers – China, India, Russia and Brazil – for trade and investment to create jobs and accelerate development in the country.

This was the core message of Economic Development Minister Ebrahim Patel to a group of visiting journalists from China, Russia, Africa, the Middle East and Britain as they got an upfront view of energy and transport infrastructure in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal during a week-long visit to the country.

The "gearing for growth" tour, organised by the International Marketing Council of South Africa, followed the release two weeks ago of a new economic growth path as the country gears up for a more intensive phase of growth following the hosting of the 2010 Fifa World Cup.

The release has sparked an intense dialogue about the economic model which can achieve a social compact between government, business and labour to best ensure sustainable growth for South Africa in the medium- to long-term.


From Gautrain ride to Durban port tour

The journalists rode on the Gautrain rapid rail link and the Rea Vaya bus rapid transit system in Johannesburg, ascended the sky walk of Moses Mabhida Stadium in Durban, traversed the extensive container terminals and grain and sugar depots at Africa's largest port of Durban, and visited the expansive Sasol plant at Secunda in Mpumalanga province.

They heard first-hand from the ministers of Economic Development and Arts and Culture and met with business and civil society leaders. They visited the Competition Commission on the eve of a landmark case defining the extent of its mandate to dismantle cartels with interventionist financial measures.

There were many moments of insight and revelation during the six-day tour, but the moment of truth for many of the visiting journalists came during the tour of Durban harbour by port manager Ricky Bikraj.

"When one sees and experiences the scale of this port you can better appreciate the crucial role of South Africa in the continent's development," said Onyekachi Wambu, a Nigerian-born journalist living in the UK who writes a regular column in New African, a London-based magazine.


Ebrahim Patel connects the dots

Another moment of truth came with the 90-minute briefing and question-and-answer session with Minister Patel, which connected the dots for the visiting journalists by drawing together the various strands of the country's emerging economic framework to balance development and growth for the benefit of all.

"I thought that Minister Patel was hugely impressive," said Enoch Wambua of the Nation Media Group in Kenya. "He really knows what he is talking about and offers great insight into the future growth trajectory of South Africa and the continent."

Coming face-to-face with a 71 000-ton sugar mountain at Durban harbour's sugar terminal was one of the highlights for Nagy Abd El Aziz of Egypt's independent daily, Al Masry Al Youm.

Egypt recently experienced a sugar shortage and wants to diversify its sources of supply. A deal to import South African sugar was announced during the visit.


The need for Africa to integrate

The need for Africa to integrate trade within the continent and revamp rail and transport systems designed to benefit the former colonial powers rather than serve the continent's own development was highlighted by Minister Patel.

He contrasted the low 10% market integration in Africa with 50% in Asia and 70% in Europe.

"The continent's transport links reflect patterns of development designed to exploit natural resources and send them elsewhere to be processed," he said, highlighting the problem of different rail gauges in different African countries.

He said that the rebuilding of Africa's infrastructure could not be a South African project but needed to involve the whole continent.

"Our future lies in balanced economic growth across the African continent," said Patel.


'The opportunities are huge'

The media tour also highlighted the growing emphasis on renewable energy – such as nuclear and solar energy and hydrogen fuel cells – as a key factor in the country's future economic growth.

Patel said that while some R800-billion would be spent on energy and transport infrastructure over the next three years, trillions of rands would be spent on energy infrastructure over the next 10 to 20 years.

"The opportunities in South Africa are huge," said Lu Yingni, an expert in renewable energy who writes for the London-based Reconnect Africa website.

At a dinner hosted by the Financial Times and the International Marketing Council in Johannesburg's Turbine Hall, Arts and Culture Minister Paul Mashatile provided an interesting insight into the role that arts and culture can play as a driver of economic growth.

He cited recent statements by Chinese President Hu Jintao, who has initiated such a process in China, in support of his thesis.

"We want to put the creative industries and cultural heritage at the heart of driving our economy," he said, citing the role that cultural heritage could play in attracting more tourists.

John Battersby is the UK country manager of the International Marketing Council of South Africa. He accompanied 20 international journalists on the "South Africa Gearing for Growth Media Tour" from 28 November to 5 December 2010.

http://www.southafrica.info/business/economy/media-tour-091210.htm

Guess our government's scheme is working as this follows annoucements of multi-billion investments by WV and GM SA as well, so our autoindustry is booming! :banana:

Government wants to boost production numbers to 1.2 million units by 2020. :cheers:

good news! EL surely needs it badly

Tata Steel to sell SA assets
Mon, 20 Dec 2010

[miningmx.com] -- INDIA's Tata Steel , the world's No. 7 steel maker, is in talks to sell its South African assets to raise more than $150m, the Economic Times reported on Monday citing a source it did not name.

Standard Chartered's India investment banking team has the mandate to select a potential buyer, the report added.

A Tata Steel official and Standard Chartered declined to comment, the paper said.

In September, Tata Steel's Managing Director H. M. Nerurkar denied reports the company was considering selling assets at its South African unit Tata Steel KZN, which it set up in 2006.

Officials at the firms could not immediately be reached for comment

Pioneer to spend R1bn on expansion

By: Reuters
5th January 2011

South African Pioneer Food Group will spend about R1-billion in the current financial year on expansion projects, it said on Wednesday.

"Capital will be spent earlier than previously estimated, to expand the capacity of the pasta facility to cater for increased demand, as well as the strategic expansion of the broiler business through an acquisition in Gauteng (province)," Zitulele Combi, chairman of Pioneer, said in the group annual report.

Pioneer, which makes bread, breakfast cereal and juices, last year agreed to pay R500 million in exchange for having investigations against it related to the unfair competition dropped.

The company had also agreed to a reduction in its gross profit by R160-million over a defined period for a selection of wheaten flour and bread products and increase its capital expenditure by R150-million.

Pioneer also said in December it plans to buy South African wine and spirits maker KWV for R828-million to diversify.

At 0932 GMT, Pioneer shares were largely flat compared with a 0,98 percent fall in Johannesburg's All-share Index.

http://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/pioneer-to-spend-r1bn-on-expansion-2011-01-05

Fillip for SA as Fitch revises rating
Jan 17 2011 17:53

Reuters & I-Net Bridge

Johannesburg - Ratings agency Fitch revised South Africa's outlook to stable from negative, saying the country had emerged from recession with its credit fundamentals roughly in line with or slightly better than peers.

Fitch said it expected real gross domestic product (GDP) growth to have recovered to 2.8% in 2010 after a contraction the previous year, and that the improvement, slightly faster than originally projected by the government, had aided fiscal consolidation.

"South Africa's post-global crisis adjustment process has been smoother than originally thought and the economy is emerging from the global recession with its credit fundamentals roughly in line with or slightly better than rated peers'," said Veronica Kalema, Director in Fitch's Sovereign group.

The National Treasury welcomed the revision, “particularly in the current economic climate with rising fiscal risks elsewhere.”

“The revised outlook reflects confidence in our credit position and future policy direction, thanks in large part to a record of prudent execution of macroeconomic policies. The government’s efforts to steer the economy to a new trajectory is another factor that will further boost confidence in the country’s policies,” it said.

After falling 1.7% in 2009, Fitch expects real GDP growth to have recovered to 2.8% in 2010. Medium-term budget deficits and debt ratios have been revised downwards.

Spending by state entities Eskom and Transnet will continue to provide a stimulus to the economy, it said.

The ability of local capital markets to finance wider deficits with relative ease emphasises a key rating strength of South Africa.

The public debt ratio is projected to stabilise at 41% of GDP in 2012/13, in line with the median for the 'BBB' category.

Due to lower-than-requested tariff increases for Eskom, the government increased the power utility's guarantee to R350bn (13.4% of 2010 GDP) from R176bn.

Fitch estimates the public sector debt to reach just below 60% of GDP in 2013/14 as the guarantee is drawn down. The facility is chiefly to enable Eskom to borrow at reduced cost to complete two major power stations.

The risk of the government being called to pay out on Eskom's guarantee facility is, in Fitch's opinion, fairly low.

Monetary policy is supporting the economic recovery and imbalances in the economy continue to improve, said Fitch.

Credit growth was just 4.6% and inflation 3.6% in November 2010.

The current account deficit narrowed to around 4% of GDP in 2009 and is expected by Fitch to remain around this level for 2010. The deficit has been more than covered by strong portfolio inflows, it said.

Structural issues in the areas of energy and transport infrastructure and labour markets continue to weigh on the ratings and, if not successfully addressed, will be become more negative for the ratings over time, it said.

http://www.fin24.com/Economy/Fillip-for-SA-as-Fitch-revises-rating-20110117

SA snubbed in investment rush

Jan 17 2011 22:09


Geneva - Developing countries and economies in transition together attracted more foreign investment than developed countries in 2010 for the first time, a United Nations study showed on Monday.

The report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad) was further evidence that economic recovery is more robust in developing than in rich countries.

However, South Africa and India saw a big drop in foreign direct investment (FDI).

Overall, flows of FDI stagnated at almost $1.12 trillion in 2010 after $1.14bn in 2009, but are still 25% below pre-crisis levels in 2005-2007, Unctad said in its latest global investment trends monitor.

Unctad repeated its forecast that global FDI would pick up to $1.3 trillion to $1.5 trillion this year, with stronger growth held back by the uneven economic recovery, investment protectionism, currency volatility and sovereign debt worries.

On the other hand, multi-national companies in developed countries are now holding a record $4 trillion to $5 trillion in cash - one source of investment, which will be seeking a home.

FDI refers to long-term investments, such as stakes in foreign companies or the construction of a plant for a subsidiary, in contrast to volatile financial investments. Businesses and economists pay close attention to UNCTAD's data.

James Zhan, director of Unctad's investment and enterprise division, said developing countries would not attract most FDI over the long term, once flows to developed countries recovered.

"The absorptive capacity of developing countries of FDI is still limited," he told a news conference.

SA not favoured

Data for 2010 showed a mixed picture, with the European Union attracting 19.9% less FDI than the previous year.

Japan also saw an 83.4% drop to $2bn, largely due to divestments by foreign companies, like carmaker Ford cutting its stake in Mazda and Liberty Global selling its stake in cable TV provider Jupiter Telecommunications to telecoms firm KDDI.

The United States saw FDI jump 43.3% to $186 billion, largely due to a significant revival of reinvested earnings of foreign affiliates - but that was still not much more than half the 2008 level.

Developing countries in Latin America, Southeast and East Asia attracted strong flows, with China topping $100bn for the first time. Hong Kong, which Unctad data treats separately from China, jumped into third place with $62.6bn.

But India saw FDI flows drop 31.5% in 2010 and flows into Africa fell 14.4%, with big drops in South Africa and Nigeria. Zhan said Unctad had not yet analysed the reasons for these falls.

FDI forms also diverged, with cross-border mergers and acquisitions rising 37 percent to $341bn in 2010, owing to the growing stockmarket value of assets and increased financial capacity of buyers. International greenfield investments, by far the biggest form, fell in both value and number.

Looking at the types of investment, economic recovery in many countries and improved performance by foreign affiliates lifted reinvested earnings to double the 2009 figure, while equity capital flows edged down and other capital flows such as intra-company loans saw a significant drop.

Unctad does not yet have a breakdown of the sources of investment, but Zhan said it was clear that developing countries were playing an increasing role as investors, as multinationals - known in Unctad as trans-national corporations or TNCs - in those countries become more financially potent.

"South-South FDI has been increasing because developing-country TNCs are investing," Zhan said.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Zuma should take serious note and shut up idiots like malema with their constant nationalisation talk.

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Business uneasy over govt intervention

Jan 16 2011


The government is quietly going ahead with its plan to become a major player in the economy, raising concerns in business circles.

Johannesburg - The government is quietly going ahead with its plan to become a *major player in the economy, but the business sector has raised concerns about the state’s capacity to implement an interventionist economic policy.

Last month President Jacob Zuma ratified the Postbank Limited Bill, which will pave the way for the state-owned savings institution, Postbank, to be converted into a *retail lender that offers products to low-income communities, particularly rural dwellers.

The news that Postbank would enter the retail banking industry came hot on the heels of an announcement last November by Zuma’s Cabinet that it had approved the first step towards the creation of a state-owned mining company.

The Cabinet approved plans to hive off African Exploration Mining and Financing Corporation from the Central Energy Fund. The corporation is intended to become a fully fledged state-owned mining company which will acquire mining assets and drive beneficiation in the industry.

Postbank spokesperson Johan Kruger said the institution, which has 2 400 branches mostly in rural areas, was hoping to apply for a banking licence from the Reserve Bank before the end of next year.

“The public stands to benefit from more services such as loans and insurance, in addition to our current savings, transactional and investment products offered at most post offices,” Kruger said.

Postbank had a customer base of 6.2m, a deposit base of R6.4bn and customer liabilities of R4.5bn.

Figures from the Finmark Trust, which researches poor people’s access to financial services, showed that 40% of the population is unbanked. Within that group, three out of every four people have never had a bank account.

Being given responsible access to loans could help the poor move up the social ladder.

The establishment of a state-owned mining firm and a bank were mentioned in the New Growth Path (NGP) document as two of the proposals aimed at involving the state strongly in the economy to create jobs and wipe out inequality. There was speculation that the state-owned mining company could be used as a vehicle to nationalise mines.

Under the NGP economic policy the state wants to push economic growth to 7% a year over the next decade; a growth rate which is projected to generate 5.5 million jobs and cut the unemployment rate to 15%. For this to happen, the state sees itself as the main driver of *economic development.

Business, however, is sceptical about the state’s involvement in running enterprises.

Neren Rau, chief executive of the SA Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said the state should steer away from operating businesses and focus on cutting excessive red tape, which is often cited as an obstacle that hamstrings investment and the development of small businesses.

“I don’t have a problem with the state being involved in kick-starting industries or promoting industrialisation, but it must remove itself afterwards,” said Rau.

“The state should not be involved in free enterprise. We would like to see the state focusing on removing obstacles to growth.”

Short-termist interests

In a paper published late last year by Business Unity SA (Busa), the country’s main voice for organised business, the organisation questioned whether the state had the manpower and skills to play a bigger role in the economy.

“Major service delivery backlogs at local government level, combined with inefficient and costly state-owned enterprises, were significant growth constraints that affected job creation.

“If the developmental state is to entail more involvement in the economy without a major increase in capacity and skills, the concern is that basic service delivery will suffer further and that the goals of the developmental state will remain at the level of lip service,” the paper read.

Busa also noted that the governments of successful countries had developed partnerships with the private sector.

“This not only brings in the capital, efficiencies and innovation that market forces generate, but *also frees the state to focus on those things that only it can do. It also avoids the corruption and nepotism that follow when the state is both player and referee in major sectors of the economy.”

Busa argued that government had to focus on improving service delivery rather than embark on creating a developmental state. It also said the state should get business involved in skills development rather than leaving it in the hands of the education system and skills education training authorities. Labour federation Cosatu, however, believes the state should be involved in the economy to redistribute wealth to address unemployment, inequality and poverty.

In its own New Growth Path document, the labour federation said the state should not shy away from creating new enterprises or nationalising strategic industries which could promote industrial development and create jobs.

The union argued that conglomerates and “short-termist financial interests” have had no incentive to promote industrial diversification beyond what was historically inherited from apartheid.

“We now sit with a complex of crises ranging from energy, water, unemployment, education and health to poverty,” the union said.

- City Press

Stiglitz urges SA to take action to weaken rand

By: Terence Creamer
17th January 2011

Nobel Memorial Prize winning economist professor Joseph Stiglitz has once again encouraged South Africa to take a more interventionist stance to weaken its exchange rate, saying that commodity-rich countries are correct to actively respond to the threat posed by over-valued currencies.

Stiglitz said at a lecture in Pretoria on Monday that countries all over the world were becoming increasingly active in implementing programmes designed to weaken and/or stabilise their currencies. The mechanisms ranged from capital controls and taxes, to prudential regulations on the banks.

The South African government, which officially supports a so-called competitive and stable exchange rate, was currently considering various interventionist options, having already given the South African Reserve Bank a mandate to accumulate reserves in a bid to weaken the rand.

The South African unit was among the best-performing currencies in 2011, having rallied to its strongest level since December 2007, late last month. But it has weakened in the first few weeks of 2011.

“South Africa has a particular problem, that’s shared by a number of others, of having the good fortune of having lots of resources. But that leads to the natural-resource curse of a high exchange rate that leads to . . . what I call ‘rich countries with poor people’.”

High exchange rates during periods of commodity strength undermined a country’s export competitiveness, which commonly led to unemployment and undermined economic diversification.

A “long-run problem” that was being exacerbated by the US Federal Reserve’s policy of quantitative easing, which Stiglitz described as a 21st century version of a “beggar-thy-neighbour” policy.

"It’s against modern fashion to talk about control, so the current language is: capital account management,” Stiglitz said, adding that he fully supported such intervention, highlighting, in particular, the recent interventionist stance taken by Chile’s “centre-Right government”.

He also argued that it would become increasingly difficult for South Africa to remain on the exchange-rate sidelines when other emerging markets were “putting up barriers”.

“What does that mean? It means that the money will go to those countries that are foolish enough not yet to have put up barriers.”

I know its a weird question, but is any of this relevant? Is there an economy in the monetary system as it exists that is sustainable in the long run or are all of these positive and negative articles short term changes in the system?

Sorry, but reading all the articles as a whole makes one a bit dispondent about the way society has built itself around a system of "economy" - which, by definition is meant to be sustainable - that is not sustainable in the long run.

Meanwhile we add corporations like Walmart to our list of 'successes'? Hmm, something isnt right...

^^Huh? Of course as long as technology is progressing and there is social/ecological stability there will economic progress, in fact it will accelarate as technology spreads around the world. what we're witnessing are the fits and starts that are inherent in capitalism, the so-called creative destruction, the world that will emerge will be far more efficient and productive, @ least IMO..

^^Huh? Of course as long as technology is progressing and there is social/ecological stability there will economic progress, in fact it will accelarate as technology spreads around the world. what we're witnessing are the fits and starts that are inherent in capitalism, the so-called creative destruction, the world that will emerge will be far more efficient and productive, @ least IMO..

Agreed - I feel that a society that incentivises making the world better for everyone rather than a few companies who have one goal, will be alot more efficient and productive

I think that under the system that exists (money system) we are held back in terms of technology and being educated as a society. Currently, companies are aimed at making a profit (ultimately) and this means selling goods at the highest price while making them at the lowest cost. This gives them incentive to all sorts of exploitations, politically, environmentally, socially, etc.

Alot of people have been saying they are scared about what the recession did or what the inevitable future recession will do, but I for one, am excited to see the change. Even if it isnt for our generation...

I know its a weird question, but is any of this relevant? Is there an economy in the monetary system as it exists that is sustainable in the long run or are all of these positive and negative articles short term changes in the system?

Sorry, but reading all the articles as a whole makes one a bit dispondent about the way society has built itself around a system of "economy" - which, by definition is meant to be sustainable - that is not sustainable in the long run.

Meanwhile we add corporations like Walmart to our list of 'successes'? Hmm, something isnt right...

Economics is a strange beast

SA car exports set for new record
42 minutes ago

Ingé Lamprecht


The ANC has welcomed Walmart's entry to SA, despite bitter opposition from the party's allies.

Johannesburg - The time is ripe for the local motor industry to exceed the record exports it achieved in 2008.

According to figures from the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of South Africa (Naamsa), vehicle exports during the global economic downturn in 2009 were almost 40% down, to 174 947 vehicles.

They recovered well last year and improved about 37% to 239 456 units.

Naamsa reckons that the industry could export 301 000 vehicles this year, 5.9% more than the 2008 record.

Econometrics economist Tony Twine said the global economic recovery had been the main reason for the improvement in vehicle exports.

He reckoned a further recovery in exports would largely depend on the sustainability of the global economic recovery.

Twine said that since export contracts were negotiated in advance, it was easier to make a relatively accurate forecast of export numbers than, for instance, of domestic sales. Of the vehicles manufactured locally last year more than half had been exported.

Leo Kok from Toyota South Africa Motors said export played an essential role in a South African motor manufacturer’s business.

The local market, he said, was not big enough to absorb all the manufacturing capacity and any plant needed the benefits of scale.

South African manufacturers therefore had to export to ensure they produced enough vehicles to achieve the necessary cost and profit targets.

Kok added that exports also gave Toyota access to new technology and ensured that its quality was up to global standards.

He said Toyota’s exports kept the company part of the international supply chain and, as such, ensured the company’s relevance.

Toyota’s Prospecton plant in Durban has an annual production capacity of 220 000 vehicles.

According to Kok last year Toyota sold 100 963 units locally, some being imported models.

In order to operate the plant viably, he said, it was essential to export vehicles.

General Motors South Africa’s communication manager Denise van Huyssteen said that export contracts not only provided benefits of scale.

They also provided a meaningful contribution to attaining the target of 50 000 units a year set by government’s Automotive Production and Development Programme (APDP) for the motor industry.

The aim of the APDP is to promote production, increase local content and create jobs.

- Sake24

For business news in Afrikaans, go to Sake24.com.

'73% more taxpayers'
Mon, 24 Jan 2011 3:58

ShareEmailMoreThe number of registered individual taxpayers in SA grew from 3.4 million in 2002/03 to 5.9 million in 2009/10, an increase of 73 percent, according to a SA Institute of Race Relations survey released on Monday.

The number of companies registered for tax grew from 815 000 in 2002/03 to 1.9 million in 2009/10, an increase of 131 percent.

Over the same period the number of trusts grew 30 percent from 255 000 to 332 000.

The number of employers registered for pay-as-you-earn (PAYE) tax grew 57 percent from 253 000 to 396 000 between 2002/03 and 2009/10.

The institute said directly or indirectly, everyone in South Africa was paying some sort of tax. This could include VAT, fuel levies or customs and excise duties.

Personal income tax collections for the 2009/10 fiscal year amounted to R207-billion.

This represented 35 percent of total revenue collections, up from 31 percent in 2008/09, and were the single biggest contributor to the government's coffers.

The second biggest contributor to government revenue in 2009/10 was VAT, which contributed 25 percent.

Corporate income tax contributed 23 percent, fuel levies five, customs and excise duties and secondary tax on companies three percent each.

Taxes classified as "other" contributed seven percent.

Researcher Marius Roodt commented that although the total contribution of personal income tax payers was the single highest, it contributed only a third of total revenue that the government received from tax.

"Corporate tax and VAT together contribute nearly 50 percent of total tax revenue. It is thus misleading to say, as some commentators do, that individual taxpayers bear the major burden of financing social grants," he said.

Per capita GDP growth less than 1%
January 24 2011 at 04:38pm

Filomena Scalise

South Africa’s per capita gross domestic product (GDP) grew at an annual average rate of less than one percent between 1970 and 2008, the SA Institute of Race Relations said on Monday.

Compared to a number of countries around the world, South Africa’s growth rate over the period was a low 0.6 percent a year, according to the institute's South Africa Survey 2009/10.

Over the same period China managed 7.9 percent a year, Botswana 5.9, Indonesia 4.3, India 3.6 and Ireland 3.5.

The United Kingdom and United States achieved 1.9 percent each per year over the period.

Researcher Marius Roodt said the real GDP per capita of an economy is often used as an indicator of the average living standard of individuals in the country, and economic growth is therefore often seen as indicating an increase in the average standard of living.

He noted that in February last year Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said to achieve five million jobs over 10 years, South Africa needed growth of over six percent a year.

The National Treasury forecasts that between 2010 and 2014 the economic growth of the country will be between three and 4.4

percent.

Roodt said it was vital that the country’s economy managed to achieve high growth rates.

“An increase in the wealth of the average South African will ensure that the country remains politically, socially, and economically stable.” - Sapa


http://www.iol.co.za/business/business-news/per-capita-gdp-growth-less-than-1-1.1016303

Zuma to sell SA in Davos
Jan 25, 2011 5:26 PM | By Sapa

President Jacob Zuma will lead the South African delegation to the 2011 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, The Presidency said on Tuesday.

"President Zuma will use the attendance of WEF to market the country, especially the drive to create jobs through attracting investments and boosting economic growth," The Presidency said.

Zuma will host a dialogue with 60 chief executives of international companies to discuss opportunities in South Africa during the WEF.

South Africa's attendance of WEF takes place just weeks following the invitation to South Africa to join the BRIC countries -- Brazil, Russia, India and China."

"Our membership of BRIC increases strategic co-operation among the emerging markets of the South, and indicates the change and new voice that is emerging globally," finance minister Pravin Gordhan said.

"We are starting the year on a positive footing and look forward to more successes on the international front, which will contribute to our job creation drive."

The Davos meeting will lay the basis for the World Economic Forum on Africa which will be held in South Africa in May.

Zuma will be accompanied by Gordhan, economic development minister Ebrahim Patel, tourism minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk, trade and industry minister Rob Davies, water and environmental affairs minister Edna Molewa and energy minister Dipuo Peters.


http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/article872864.ece/Zuma-to-sell-SA-in-Davos

‘No time for SA to relax on oversight’
IMF warns on regulatory complacency after financial crisis
SURE KAMHUNGA
Published: 2011/01/26 06:38:21 AM

THE International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned SA against regulatory complacency that could expose its financial sector to damage from contagion due to problems in other economies.

The IMF’s financial counsellor and director in charge of monetary and capital markets, Jose Vinals, said yesterday while SA’s success in weathering the worst of the financial crisis reflected a tight regulatory environment, this was no time to relax.

Mr Vinals was speaking at the launch in Sandton yesterday of the IMF’s global economic and financial stability reports.

He suggested co-operation and consultation between the Reserve Bank and the Department of Finance should continue to establish how the financial sector could be strengthened and comply with global regulators’ tougher capital and liquidity requirements .

The Treasury will soon release a discussion document proposing methods of strengthening SA’s system of financial regulation and implementing a macro-prudential approach to supervision.

It will propose new legislation to regulate over-the-counter derivative trading, hedge funds and credit rating agencies. The Securities Services Act will be replaced by the Financial Markets Bill and Credit Rating Services Bill.

Mr Vinals said the complexity of SA’s financial sector and the expansion of its banks and other financial institutions into less sophisticated African markets made continued regulatory oversight imperative .

"We are satisfied that SA has weathered the financial crisis well and I think this has been due primarily to the regulatory oversight and support that has been quite protective," he said.

"This has been complemented by the business models of the banks, who did not invest in toxic assets or weird things. It is important not to be complacent and to continue working together to improve co-ordination, particularly among the local regulators like the central bank and the Ministry of Finance."

The IMF’s economic counsellor and director of research, Olivier Blanchard, projected global output of 4,5% — up from about 4% estimated in October.

He called for urgency in dealing with fiscal imbalances and financial instability in some developed economies, particularly in the US where President Barack Obama’s government is under pressure to boost job creation.

SA’s success in managing the transition from the crisis has earned the country favourable ratings from Fitch. Last week, the agency upgraded SA’s country rating from negative to stable, saying its growth prospects were brighter than previously thought.

The economy is expected to grow as much as 3,2% this year, rising to almost 4% next year — reversing a decline of almost 1,9% in 2009 and an estimated growth of 2,7% last year.

Mr Vinals said global financial stability was still not assured, and significant policy challenges remained to be addressed.

Problems facing e uro-zone economies such as Portugal and Ireland were cause for concern, he said, and governments should restore stability and confidence in the financial sector.

The IMF’s deputy director in the Africa department, Sharmini Coorey, said she did not think it was prudent for SA to lift interest rates because they needed to support economic growth.

She singled out inflation as a threat to sustainable growth in SA, with tepid investment growth and slow job creation. Administered price increases and pressure on private and public sector wages could be inflationary.

Ms Coorey was not worried about threats of political interference in the economy after the African National Congress Youth League’s threats of nationalisation of assets . The IMF was happy with the government’s fiscal and monetary policies.

She said the IMF had been impressed with the emphasis in the government’s New Growth Plan on job creation.

This was despite misgivings by the private sector that the government would be unable to reach its target of creating 5-million jobs, given some of the structural weaknesses in the economy.

kamhungas@bdfm.co.za


http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=132439

Good to see taking the global lead on this issue. Reaffirms our world-class status re: corporate accountability...

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King sets up plan for guidance on integrated reports
In world first, framework will help firms in providing information for ‘a new era’
SANCHIA TEMKIN
Published: 2011/01/26 06:38:20 AM

A WORLD-first initiative to launch a framework for integrated reporting by companies was unveiled in SA yesterday, but it was followed by warnings about the additional burden it will place on auditors .

Launched by SA’s doyen of corporate governance, Mervyn King, the initiative aims to provide guidance to the 400 companies listed on the JSE that are obliged from next month to produce an integrated annual report containing information on sustainability and financial status.

After several huge corporate failures across the world in the past decade, auditors believe information about sustainability issues in annual reports will provide an early-warning system for shareholders and investors.

But auditors in SA are concerned they do not have the expertise to sign off on such reports.

Mr King, chairman of SA’s Integrated Reporting Committee and the King Committee on Corporate Governance, said yesterday that the old form of annual reports, focusing primarily on financial information and the short- term horizon, was no longer adequate to meet the needs of investors and other stakeholders.

Speaking at a media briefing in Johannesburg , Mr King said investors needed information that would allow them to make an informed assessment of the long- term sustainability of a company.

He said they should also be informed about how sustainability issues had been incorporated into a compan y’s strategic direction.

It was for this reason that the King Committee recommended in the King 3 report that companies issue integrated reports .

"We are entering a new era in corporate reporting," he said.

SA is the first country to mandate integrated reporting for all listed companies — by entities with their financial year starting on or after March 1 last year .

"Every major capital market must follow SA’s lead soon — this ultimately needs to be the universal global practice," said Mr King. "The problem is no specific guideline or standard defining the content of an integrated report for listed companies exists in SA or elsewhere in the world."

Companies that have produced integrated reports include BASF, Philips and Novo Nordisk .

The Integrated Reporting Committee was formed in SA last year, and subsequently the International Integrated Reporting Committee was established.

Mr King said the international committee intended issuing a discussion document later this year, to be presented to the Group of 20 nations in November.

He said because of the urgent need for guidance in SA, the local committee could not wait for the international discussion paper to be issued. "This is why today is such a historic event."

Mr King said SA’s committee would liaise closely with the international committee to ensure alignment of the two reporting frameworks. He is deputy chairman of the international committee.

John Burke, head of listings at the JSE, said there were sanctions in place for companies that did not comply with the regulations. None had been applied yet.

Graham Terry, senior executive for strategy and thought leadership at the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants, said integrated reporting forced companies to take a deeper look at their long- term sustainability, while making this insight more accessible to stakeholders, including shareholders. Leon Campher, CEO of the Association for Savings and Investment SA, said SA was once again setting global best-practice trends .

"The quality of information presented to investors and shareholders determines the credibility of the company and its financial results," Mr Campher said.

But Sandy van Esch, director for standards at the Independent Regulatory Board for Auditors, said auditors might not be comfortable signing off on certain issues in integrated reports, particularly relating to the environment.

They would probably require the assistance of specialists such as environmentalists and scientists .

The guidelines require integrated reports to identify both the positive and negative effect of companies’ decisions and activities on financial, social, and environmental systems.

The integrated report should also contain a statement of the risks having a bearing on companies’ activities; an account of their current financial performance; and a forward-looking statement of expected activities and objectives.

It should also include information on how companies’ executives are remunerated.

The discussion document is available for comment until April 25, after which the framework would be finalised, said Mr King.


temkins@bdfm.co.za


http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=132436

Seems there are some benefits to a strong rand ... !

Rand helps contain factory gate prices
Jan 27 2011 12:30

Reuters & I-Net Bridge

Johannesburg - South Africa's producer inflation braked to 5.8% year-on-year (y/y) in December from 6.2% in November, Statistics SA data showed on Thursday.

It said on a monthly basis producer price inflation (PPI), which represents domestic output, also slowed to 0.3% from 0.7% in November.

A Reuters survey of eight economists saw PPI slowing to 5.9% y/y in December and to 0.4% on a month-on-month basis.

Exported commodities inflation was lower at 6% y/y in December from 6.2% the previous month, but imported commodities inflation quickened to 0.7% y/y from 0.5%.

Analysts welcomed the figure.

Brait economist Colen Garrow said the effect of the strong rand was being felt.

"I think it's the impact of the strong rand coming through, which is obviously good. But I think in 12 months' time we must start preparing ourselves for a rate hike," he said.

"But for now, the inflation numbers promote a case of rates moving sideways. There are some negatives creeping in like electricity prices and property taxes from July, and inflation readings are going to be magnified through the course of the year as the base effects arise from last year. So maybe a rate hike in Q4."

Consumer inflation slowed to 3.5% in December from 3.6% y/y in November, data showed last week.

The Reserve Bank left its key repo rate unchanged as expected last week - after 650 basis points of cuts since late 2008 - citing an improving economic outlook and rising inflation risks.

Carmen Altenkirch, economist at Nedbank, said the strong rand continued to contain commodity price increases.

"The rand remains a key risk in the outlook for producer inflation. With the carry trade likely to play a less dominant role this year, upward pressure on the rand is likely to be limited.

"This implies that higher global agricultural and commodity prices will feed through more quickly into domestic inflation, as there is no offsetting appreciation of the currency," she said.

She added that higher commodity prices, which will filter through to domestic inflation at both the producer and consumer level, are likely to be a key theme in 2011.

Stanlib economist Kevin Lings said the figure was a good one.

"The 5.8% PPI number tells a good story; it is the manageable increase. However, the biggest threat to PPI in the short to medium term is the increasing international price pressures feeding through to our market."

Johann Els, senior economist at Old Mutual Investment Group, said although there was some moderation in the PPI this does not suggest that the consumer price index will necessarily edge down.

"I'm of the view that CPI will continue to rise this year due to rising petrol and food inflation," he said.

Seems SA's unemployment rate is much lower than assumed. Makes sense to me as in other countries with large informal sectors, those in the informal sector (for example, self-employed sreet vendors etc, but outside the tax net) are counted amongst the "employed".

-----------------

SA’s labour force ‘far bigger than estimate’
Adcorp Holdings believe the South African labour market is far bigger than estimated.
SANCHIA TEMKIN
Published: 2011/01/31 07:21:40 AM

THE accuracy of SA’s labour force statistics were challenged by human capital management and business process outsourcing group Adcorp Holdings at an employment seminar on Friday. It said the statistics did not account for the informal sector of employment and the labour force was 47,7% larger than estimated.

A war of words erupted over the official employment rate, which stands at 12,9-million people. However, Statistics SA agreed to engage in dialogue with Adcorp, which may change the way labour force statistics are presented in future. Adcorp labour market analyst Loane Sharp said there were 6,19-million people employed in the unofficial sector, according to new research carried out by the company. "There are 19,2- million employed people in SA, according to our study," he said.

Adcorp accounted for its research by looking at the increased use of cash in the informal sector, by vendors, entrepreneurs and other people carrying on business but not registered for tax deductions. It compared these figures with the quarterly labour force statistics.

Mr Sharp said StatsSA’s quarterly labour force survey was "fast losing relevance" and "by 2020 (the statistics) will become obsolete".

Patrick Kelly , executive manager at StatsSA, said Adcorp had failed to produce any documented methodology on how it accounted for its research. StatsSA used a scientific method in formulating its data, based on recognised international practices, he said.

Mr Sharp said the quarterly labour force survey produced by StatsSA observed 30000 dwellings quarterly, which was an implicit study of only 0,86% of the population a year. However, t he quarterly economic figures, also produced by StatsSA, were a "better, simpler characterisation of the official economy", he said.

Adcorp’s employment index observed more than 1-million job seekers a year, which was an implicit study of 12% of formal labour market transactions, Mr Sharp said.

temkins@bdfm.co.za



http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=132891

Malcolm Rees
31 January 2011 07:25
The state of our economy: What recent research tells us

Macro-economic indicators point to a slow and steady but not stable economic landscape.

JOHANNESBURG - If you operate a business and thought things would get significantly better economically this year, think again.

Key local and global macro-economic indicators out this week paint a fairly dreary picture.

The Reserve Bank's business cycle indicator

The Reserve Bank this week released its composite leading business cycle indicator for November 2010 which remained "virtually unchanged", decreasing marginally by 0.1 % compared with the preceding month.

The indicator is designed to give economists an understanding of the direction of the local economy in terms of its business cycle, which historically fluctuates through hills and troughs over periods of a number of years.

Accordingly, upwards/downwards movements in the leading indicator should show a rough positive correlation with movements in macro-economic growth some months later.

November's 0.1% decrease is essentially a continuation in a trend of slight downward movement in the indicator since it levelled-off around the end of the first quarter of 2010 after climbing sharply through 2009 as SA began to work its way out of the recession.

Although a drop of 0.1% is "nothing dramatic", according to Dr Azar Jammine, a chief economist at Econometrix, he notes that the continuation of the indicator's sidewards movement suggests that the recovery in South Africa's economy has already taken place.

Thus, while South Africa should, at this point, not expect any imminent recessionary type movements, the indicator suggests that there will be little to no expansion on current levels of growth through the beginning/mid parts of 2011.

Businesses struggling to improve their growth from current levels should not expect any help from increases in spending from the market at large.

According to Jammine, this trend also makes it less likely that we will see any interest rate adjustments in the foreseeable future.

While consumers and businesses can continue to rely on relatively cheap credit, the economy can expect no further boosts from impeding interest rate cuts and our stubbornly high ratios of household debt to income may be expected to remain.

A reality which has already prompted SA's leading banks to forecast negative growth in real terms in the residential property market.

The International Monetary Fund's WEO update

Roughly in-line with the trend suggested by the composite leading business cycle indicator, came the adjustments to the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) World Economic Outlook (WEO) Survey.

The WEO placed GDP growth in South Africa at 3.4% for 2011, increasing slightly to 3.8% in 2012. These growth projections had been adjusted downwards by 0.1% from predictions made by the survey in October 2008.

If realised, the survey's projections would see South Africa's GDP growth expand by 0.6% in 2011 from the WEO's calculation of a 2,8% growth rate in 2010. This forecasted growth is well below estimates for both other emerging economies as well as for sub-Saharan Africa as a large.

Growth in advanced economies is expected to sit at around 2.5 %, down from 3% in 2010. By contrast emerging economies globally are expected to grow by a robust 6.5% (from 7.1% in 2010) with growth in Sub-Saharan Africa expected to sit at 5.5% (from 5% in 2010).

"For some time we have been underperforming the emerging markets and sub-Saharan growth rate," said Mike Schussler, director of economists.co.za, "I would say SA is on the weaker side of African growth.

"With the current commodity boom and with current interest and inflation rates we should be having a much bigger growth rate".

Schussler is of the opinion that with our relatively open and transparent markets we should be receiving a much higher percentage of foreign capital inflow, the fact that we aren't is a worry.

This apparent underperformance is a "concern", according to Schussler. With interest and inflation rates unlikely to improve and the commodity boom considered by Schussler to be a potential bubble, there is less room for GDP expansion from current low levels. Movements away from current growth projections are thus more likely to be negative rather than positive.

The high growth/ low growth gap between developed and emerging economies, combined with low interest rates in advanced economies, is expected to boost the inflow of foreign capital into emerging markets. This is good, but also dangerous.

"These capital flows present both an opportunity and a challenge for emerging economies. An opportunity, as they decrease the cost at which these countries can borrow; a challenge because they can lead to overheating and bubbles," Olivier Blanchard, the IMF's chief economist, was reported as saying in the IMF's online survey magazine.

The possibility of the development of bubbles as foreign capital is pumped into market sectors of emerging economies will add to volatility in emerging areas.

As Dr Jammine has pointed out, the UN, and our, projections of economic growth have incorporated "lots of huge assumptions" around the stability of the local and global economies.

Attempts to re-adjust the global economy to alleviate the effects of excessive global debt accumulated during the boom years leading up to the recession could create global economic volatility including mass inflation following the US's quantitative easing policies.

"Volatility could be the order of the day".

The South African Institute for Race Relation's (SAIRR's) per capita growth rate analysis

Between the period 1970-2008 South Africa's GDP per capita, our economic growth divided by our population growth, sat at a mere 0.6%, according to the latest South Africa Survey released by SAIRR.

As developing countries, such as ours work off a lower base, ie, a lower net GDP figure, it should be easier for them to achieve a higher annual percentage increases in their GDP per capita than developed countries.

However, our poor per capita growth rate is well below comparable developing nations, such as Botswana (5.9%), China (7.9%) and India (3.6%) as well as developed nations, such as the US, the UK (1.9%) and Ireland (3.5%) over the same period, according to the survey.

The gross national income per capita, which is roughly equitable to GDP per capita, is a key measure used in the calculation of the Human Development Index (HDI), which is designed to measure improvements in the quality of life of a nation's citizens.

According to the United Nation's Development Projects' (UNDP) 2010 HDI Index, South Africa ranks 110th out of 162 countries evaluated with an index score of 0.597, not bad in relation to sub-Saharan Africa's aggregated score of 0,389 but still significantly lower than the global average of 0.624.

And, said Dr Jammine, improvement in the quality of life of SA's citizens may be "worse than" suggested by the SAIRR.

"You're probably finding that the per capita income has increased for the rich and not for the poor," he said, as they "have skills" that would have benefited.

A rise in GDP per capita "doesn't mean to say that growth is equally spread".

South Africa suffers from endemic unemployment which refuses to budge from around 25%.

In order to reduce that figure the country would need to consistently produce GDP growth well in excess of population growth while simultaneously working to ensure that it is the population at-large that benefits from that economic expansion.

As the effects of HIV/Aids begin to take hold and combine with relatively low life expectancy at birth figures, SA's forecasted population growth has been radically down casted to annual mid-level prediction of 0.47% between 2010 and 2015 and 0,38% between 2015 and 2020, according to the World Population Prospects released by the UN's Population Division.

Although well below forecasted GDP growth rates Jammine still believes that "we don't stand a chance in hell" of achieving the government's target of creating 5 million jobs in ten years and that we're "certainly not going to see half a million jobs created in 2011".

Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan has said that in order to reach the 5m jobs in ten years target South Africa's annual average growth rate over the next decade would need to sit at 6%.

Poor levels of GDP per capita growth in conjunction with an inequitable spread of that growth is not good for smaller businesses in SA said Dr Jammine.

An unemployment rate of 25% both holds-back macro-economic GDP development and reduces the effective market of consumers that smaller businesses could hope to draw revenue from.

It implies minimal increases of consumer disposable income, with increases of spending power in lower LSM segments especially ill-affected.

As the rich get richer and the poor get poorer there are fewer opportunities for smaller businesses to capture business from emerging-consumer markets.

Relatively low levels of GDP growth, inequitable income distribution combined with low GDP growth per capita and limited forecasted GDP growth expansion jointly paint a picture of an economic landscape in which it is likely to be a "tough environment for small and medium sized businesses, very tough", says Dr Jammine.

Statistics South Africa's liquidations numbers

Liquidations for South African businesses for 2010 decreased by 3.4% compared to 2009 (ie, from 4 133 to 3 992 businesses) said Statistics South Africa (SatsSA) in their liquidations and insolvencies report released on Monday.

A year-on-year decrease of 14.9% was recorded for December 2010 with close corporation liquidations decreasing by 8.5% and company liquidations increasing by 2.6%.

Said Arthur Goldstuck whose company World Wide Worx runs the SME Survey, looking into the health of the small to medium enterprise sector, the numbers are "more a reflection of how SMEs toughened-up and become more resilient than that the ‘good times' have come around".

He believes that SMEs have been pushed to the brink by the recession and that while the current forecasts in GDP growth have created a climate in which those SMEs that toughed-out the hard times will be able to survive massive growth in the sector is unlikely.

And he believes that any further major economic upsets (such as commodity price bubbles and load-shedding) may push many of them off the edge.

He suggests that with little GDP expansion SMEs operating today will struggle to expand their businesses. In turn, they will not be able to hire more staff.

"SMEs are the growth engine of employment," said Goldstuck, but the low GDP growth/high unemployment combination creates a "vicious circle, SMEs are supposed to create employment but in order to do that they need to expand their businesses which they can't do as more people become unemployed".


http://www.moneyweb.co.za/mw/view/mw/en/page295043?oid=526966&sn=2009+Detail&pid=287226

Fantastic news
South Africa posts R10,3bn trade surplus
By: Creamer Media Reporter
31st January 2011

South Africa recorded a trade surplus of R10,3-billion in December, as exports stood at R53,9-billion, while imports of R43,6-billion were reported, official data showed on Monday.

This compared with a trade surplus of R8,4-billion in November 2010, indicating a month-on-month improvement of R1,9-billion.

The South African Revenue Service (Sars) said that the surplus was buoyed by higher commodity exports, specifically in iron-ore, precious metals and base metals.

Overall trade activity was down in December, as exports decreased by R6,3-billion, or 10,4%, and imports fell by R8,2-billion, or 15,9%.

Sars also highlighted that South Africa reported an overall yearly surplus for the first time since 2003, when a yearly surplus of R12-billion was recorded.

The overall surplus for 2010 was R5-billion compared with a deficit of R27,3-billion in 2009, an improvement of R32,3-billion or 118,3%.

Sars added that the November to December change in exports of goods reflected decreases largely in prepared foodstuffs, beverages and tobacco, which decreased by R459-million – a drop of 25%.

Vehicles, aircraft and vessels exports decreased by R807-million, or 15%.

Mineral products exports decreased by R908-million, representing a decrease of 6%.

Precious and semi-precious stones and metals decreased by R1,6-billion – down 10%.

Base metals and articles thereof decreased by R1,6-billion – down 18%.

The November to December change in imports of goods – an overall 15,9% drop – was owing largely to fewer imports of metals and minerals.

Mineral products decreased by R365-million (-4%), plastics and rubber and articles thereof decreased by R417-million (-21%), and imports of base metals and articles thereof decreased by R843-million (-35%).

Textile and textile articles imports dropped by R478-million (-28%).

Original equipment components decreased by R1,1-billion (-37%), while machinery and electrical appliances imports declined by R2,4-billion (-18%).

Products of the chemical or allied industries decreased by R1,1-billion (-24%).

There was an increase in vehicles, aircraft and vessels imports of R324-million (6%).

Looking further afield, Sars noted that in Asia the deficit increased from R1,7-billion in November to R2,1-billion in December 2010. Exports decreased by R 3,4-billion to R18,1-billion and imports decreased by R3-billion to R20,2-billion.

In Europe, the deficit of R2,5-billion in November changed to a surplus of R0,2-billion in December 2010. Exports decreased by R0,9-billion to R14,1-billion and imports decreased by R3,6-billion to R13,9-billion.

In the US, the surplus decreased from R0,7-billion in November to R0,6-billion in December 2010. Exports decreased by R0,3-billion to R6,1-billion and imports decreased by R0,2-billion to R5,5-billion.

For the whole of Africa, the surplus increased from R4,9-billion in November to R5,3-billion in December 2010. Exports decreased by R0,9-billion to R8,2-billion and imports decreased by R1,3-billion to R3-billion.

http://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/south-africa-posts-r103bn-trade-surplus-2011-01-31

Thanks for all the good news guys.

^^That's really great news.

I have always felt and stated that the official unemployement rate is too high, they never include the informal sector, and it is HUGE and lucrative here.
It is largely due to the negative reporting that we constantly hear of crime and unemployment figures that are pumped up, with only half the story told, to perpetuate the racist myth that SA is headed down the drain, whilst the exact OPPOSITE is glaringly obvious to anyone willing to look beyond the headlines.

http://www.eprop.co.za/news/article.aspx?idArticle=13323

Nestle SA injects R505m into local economy
03 Feb 2011 - I-Net Bridge -

Intro
Nestle South Africa announced on Wednesday that it will invest R505 million into the construction of two new factories.

Nestle South Africa announced on Wednesday that it will invest R505 million into the construction of two new factories.

The company also announced its recent acquisition of a soya processing company in Potchefstroom. These investments will create 350 permanent jobs.

"Nestle is proud to make this announcement today as it demonstrates our ongoing commitment to investment in South Africa. We will continue to invest in South Africa, in line with our long-term commitment to business sustainability and economic development," said Sullivan O'Carroll, Chairperson and Managing Director of Nestle South Africa.

Nestle South Africa is investing R244 million in the construction of a 16,000 square metre factory at Babelegi for the production of MILO and CHEERIO cereals which are currently being imported.

This investment will create 70 permanent jobs and at least 100 indirect jobs in the construction phase. Skills development and training abroad will be provided to some of the permanent employees by Nestle 's global specialists in the areas of engineering and technology.

A further R155 million will be invested in the construction of another factory in Babelegi for the production of MAGGI products. This new factory will create 160 permanent jobs and at least 200 indirect jobs in the construction phase.

The company also announced its recent R106 million acquisition and upgrade of Potchefstroom based Specialised Protein Products (SPP), which also included the absorption of 120 employees.

This acquisition will increase the production capacity of Nestle's non-dairy creamers and offers the company an opportunity to develop good quality and affordable soya based products.

"These investments are aligned to Nestle's ambition of being the world's leading Nutrition, Health and Wellness Company while offering consumers quality, nutritious and affordable products.

"Local business will also benefit from this as most raw materials required for the manufacturing of

our products will be sourced locally, thus creating a market for local business and emerging farmers," concluded O'Carroll.

This has been posted before in abbreviated form, but here is a fuller explanation of why South Africa's unemployment figures are actually far lower than the haters love to say...

Employment in South Africa: New, mind-boggling research
Thursday, 10 February 2011
Over the past 16 years we have relied exclusively on Stats SA for this data. Last week Adcorp challenged this with new, paradigm shifting, evidence.

Loane Sharp, head of research at Adcorp tells us, “South Africans may well be the most remarkable people in history. Having made a peaceful and generally cheerful transition from authoritarian rule to democracy in 1994, South Africans have found imaginative solutions to many post-apartheid problems. Following the collapse of government health services, private sector health services have spontaneously emerged that serve 48% of the population in a given year. Following a sharp uptick in the crime rate, private security services have sprung up and more than 500,000 private security guards now out-number the policemen and women on active duty.

Following deterioration in government-operated schools, entrepreneurs called “edu-preneurs” have set up independent, private schools that serve both rich and poor alike with remarkable success rates. Following backlogs and delays in the administration of justice, private mechanisms have emerged all over the place that provide quick and inexpensive dispute resolution services. South Africa’s private sector is undoubtedly one of the most entrepreneurial and responsive to consumer needs in the world.” Yet, according to official statistics, a great pall hangs over this otherwise great success story...unemployment”

Background
Cees Bruggemans, Chief Economist of FNB recently wrote in Business Day, using the Stats SA numbers (Unfolding Tragedy 31st Jan 2011), “Today our population is about 50 million. Those younger than 15 and older than 65 years of age are called ‘dependents and retirees’. There are 18 million of them. That leaves a pool of 15-65 year olds, some 32 million strong today. Among them there are some 12.5 million who are not economically active (pupils, students, homemakers and people unable to work for a variety of reasons). This leaves an available labour force of 19.5 million today. This splits two ways. Some 13 million work, of which 9 million formally and some 4 million informally. The remainder (some 6.5 million) is unemployed, of which 4.5 million are still seeking work (but so far no luck) and 2 million described as discouraged (no longer looking)”.

Loane points out “If what Stats SA tells us is correct, then in the bigger picture 8.53 million people, or 49% of the labour force, are unemployed, underemployed or permanently disheartened about finding work. Seventy-four % of youth under the age of 35 are unemployed. Only 9% of matriculants will find work within a year of leaving school. It is not hard to extrapolate from the official statistics to a situation of mass disgruntlement and popular resentment, leading down a road to nowhere."

"But, our research tells us that these official statistics are wrong!"

"At Adcorp, (South Africa’s largest employment services company and the country’s leading authority of labour market trends), we have reliable research that prove Statistics SA’s official measurement of employment is to be mistaken. Whilst there may only be 12.96 million people formally employed, there is a total of 19.2 million people engaged in some or other form of economic activity, properly counting the informal, unofficial sector of the economy.”

If this is true, the picture changes considerably
According to Adcorp’s research, "economic activity in the unofficial sectors (6.19 million) very nearly equals the number of unemployed and discouraged people in the formal sector (6.43 million), which suggests that – if the informal sector is fully accounted for – South Africa’s situation is quite different to what has typically been portrayed. The unemployment rate in the formal sector may well be 25.3%, but there is no question that the rate of people totally excluded from any form of economic activity, including the informal sector, is possibly as low as 7.9%.”

This puts us on a par with many developed countries!

Research methodology
Loane continues, “The statistical methods used (by Stats SA) to reach these conclusions are somewhat arcane, involving the comparison of officially recorded economic activity against the accelerating growth of cash transactions outside the official, recorded sectors of the economy, which are themselves largely connected with the evasion of taxes and the avoidance of labour laws. But Adcorp’s statistical methods are based on widely accepted international norms for calculating the size of the informal economy, and Adcorp’s real innovation has been to use these estimates to calculate the number of people employed in the informal economy.

By contrast, Stats SA calculate that the informal sector numbers to be only 2.17 million people and – in contrast with every South African’s daily observations – this figure has evidently declined from 2.3 million people in 2008 (the last year for which coherent data are available). According to Adcorp research, unofficial employment (growing at 6.7% per annum) will exceed official employment (growing at 0.9% per annum) by 2020."

Of course, employment in the informal sector is not as luxurious or secure as employment in the formal sector.

"In fact, in many cases informal employment is brutish and mean. Wage rates in the informal sector are purely market-related and bear no relation to the raft of laws regulating pay and working conditions. Informal sector workers do not have access to medical aids, retirement funds or dispute resolution procedures, which are Stats SA’s minimum requirements for designating someone a “formal” employee."

Yet for many people, especially young people, it is the only available means of lifting oneself by one’s bootstraps. Adcorp interacts with more than 1,000,000 job-seekers and finds work for 200,000 people, lifting people from the informal sector, where they have acquired some rudimentary skills, experience and a disciplined work ethic, into the formal sector, where they usually go on to aspirational careers.

“We may argue over the decimal places in our numbers. But Adcorp’s research indisputably presents a picture of an economy that is better able to create economic opportunities than the official statistics suggest. In fact, it holds bold lessons for government: if conditions in the formal sector were better aligned to conditions in the informal sector – notably collective bargaining and dismissal protections, which are notably absent in the fast-growing and job-creating informal sector – formal sector employment would not nearly be the economic, social and political crisis that it is today.”

Loane concludes “We have looked through our ability to create jobs through one eye, that of the formal sector and the developmental state, we have totally underestimated the entrepreneurial spirit in the informal and second economy. Our previous measurement methodology has been flawed. There is a different picture out there and this has massive implications for policy making going forward.”

Conclusion
Gathering statistics, conducting research and drawing conclusions is a difficult job. We all accept that, nevertheless there are four critical issues that need clear answers when research is commissioned:

What research needs to be conducted?
What is the most appropriate methodology?
What ethical issues are there in the conducting of the research?
What are the implications for national policy?
Clearly the methodology employed by Stats SA, using the 2001 population census and a survey of 30 000 households, is different from the methodology employed by Adcorp, tracking a million job applicants a year. However, in a situation where the findings of the research are so remarkably different the consequences are considerable for government policy. Take one example – the payment of social grants. Currently 13 million people benefit from social grants. The question on all of our minds must be, “how many of these claimants are benefitting from some form of informal employment and yet claiming to be unemployed”?

In essence Adcorp’s findings have far-reaching implications for all our social policy issues; housing, feeding, schooling, healthcare, child support and urbanisation to name a few.

So while the research conducted by Adcorp presents a very different picture of our employment / unemployment challenges in South Africa, it is really important that this private sector initiative be embraced by government.
In recent times we have witnessed the President’s call for 5 million jobs to be created; proposed amendments to our labour laws; the debate on decent work; and the banning of labour brokers - all of which are government initiatives designed to alleviate our unemployment challenges.

But the question remains: If the Adcorp research is right, maybe we should be spending more time encouraging our ‘newly discovered’ and booming entrepreneurial sector (the only sustainable creator of jobs), making it easier for them to exist while offering basic protection to those they employ, rather than expecting government to create jobs (never worked anywhere) and making legislative compliance so onerous that these budding entrepreneurs, and those they employ, hide from the government gatherers of statistics?

*Loane Sharp is an economist and labour analyst at Adcorp, South Africa’s leading provider of staffing, human capital management and business process outsourcing services and an eminent authority on the South African labour market.

Great article! Articulate and well argued!

This shows that the government should be focusing on policy to move the informal economy into the formal economy, not just focus on creating new formal sector economy jobs.

http://www.engineeringnews.co.za/

SA studies R15bn multi-metal beneficiation plant


By: Terence Creamer
15th February 2011

South Africa is studying the feasibility of developing what it terms the world’s first integrated metals plant capable of “beneficiating” titanium, zirconium, vanadium, magnesium and silicone, Economic Development Minister Ebrahim Patel told lawmakers on Tuesday.

Should the project prove viable, it would involve an invesment of R15-billion and could create more than 7 000 jobs in construction, as well as in the operation of the plant.

Patel did not disclose the proposed project site, nor did he provide details as to which entity was conducting the study.

However, it is anticipated that the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC), whose mandate in pursuing so-called ‘high-impact projects’ was highlighted in President Jacob Zuma’s recent State of the Naiton address, could be involved. It is also possible that the State-owned minerals processing and metallurgical engineering organisation Mintek could play a role.

The IDC has indicated previously that it is interrogating the prospect of establishing a vertically integrated steel mill and that it was also investigating steelmaking technologies that could make use of Bushveld magnetite and other available dumps to make steel.

Under the aegis of the New Growth Path, South Africa was prioritising the finalisaiton of a beneficiation strategy, which would seek to ensure that more value and employment was extracted from the country’s mineral resources prior to export.

South African Miners Dig Deeper to Extend Gold Veins' Life Spans .Article Stock By ROBB M. STEWART
JOHANNESBURG—With few new gold strikes around the world that can be turned into profitable mines, South Africa's gold miners are planning to dig deeper than ever before to get access to rich veins.

View Full Image

Reuters

A mine worker walks underground in Gold Fields' South Deep mine outside Johannesburg last June.
.The plans raise questions about how to safely and profitably mine several miles below the surface. Success would mean overcoming problems such as possible rock falls, flooding and ventilation challenges and designing technology to overcome the threats.

Mark Cutifani, chief executive officer of AngloGold Ashanti Ltd., has a picture in his office of himself at one of the deepest points in Africa, roughly 4,000 meters, or 13,200 feet, down in the company's Mponeng mine south of Johannesburg. Mr. Cutifani sees no reason why Mponeng, already the deepest mining complex in the world, shouldn't in time operate an additional 3,000-plus feet deeper.

"The most critical challenges for all of us in South Africa are depths and depletion of reserves," Mr. Cutifani said in an interview.

Deep mining isn't easy, nor pleasant. The deeper a mine goes, the more at risk it is from underground earthquakes, rock bursts, gas discharges and flooding. And for workers, conditions themselves get progressively more uncomfortable from heat and cramped spaces.

South Africa is at the forefront of deep mining. Agnico-Eagle Mines Ltd.'s LaRonde mine in northwestern Quebec, one of the deepest mines outside South Africa, operates at about 7,260 feet below the surface. Before closing in 2002, Homestake Gold Mine in South Dakota was considered the deepest mine in the Western Hemisphere at about 8,045 feet. Nowhere else do mines go so deep as in South Africa, and lessons learned there from attempts to extend the life spans of mines will be applicable globally, not just for gold but for extracting other minerals underground.
Deep Dive: Miners Fight Gold's Decline in South AfricaBUSINESS DAY
Gold Majors Manage to Keep Expanding
Learn More South Africa, once the leader, began to slip in the global gold-production rankings in 2006 and continues to do so, as mining companies have used up higher-grade reserves in their mines. The country fell a further notch in 2009, this time to fourth behind China, the U.S. and Australia. Local executives expect the trend to continue.

The country's two biggest gold companies, AngloGold and Gold Fields Ltd., have plans to fight back and expect to maintain output levels in the years ahead—by digging downward and outward.

AngloGold produced 4.599 million troy ounces of gold in 2009. Gold Fields produced 3.497 million ounces in the year through June 2010. Canada's Barrick Gold Corp. is the world's biggest gold company, with production last year of 7.42 million ounces.

Gold production in South Africa fell 5.8% to 204,922.8 kilograms (6.6 million troy ounces) in 2009, according to the Chamber of Mines of South Africa, an industry body.

But Nicholas Holland, CEO of Gold Fields, remains optimistic. "The South African gold industry does have a future; we have been beating ourselves up far too much," he says.
Mining in general in South Africa has been dogged by rising costs as unionized workers have demanded double-digit wage increases, while the state power company has been given the go-ahead to raise average charges to companies and households roughly 25% a year for three years.

For South African gold miners, the strength of the rand, which rose almost 10% against the dollar in 2010 and more than 30% from 2008 to 2010, has also mitigated some of gold's strong price in dollars, which increased roughly 25% last year.

South Africa's problems aren't unique, Mr. Holland says. "The gold price has doubled in four years, but globally the industry has stagnated and is struggling to replace reserves."

For AngloGold and Gold Fields, the world's third- and fourth-largest producers of the metal, this has meant bidding for assets in other parts of Africa, South America and elsewhere when opportunities arise. And in their home country, it means looking for ways to access gold they are sitting on.

View Full Image

Bloomberg News
http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/MK-BJ973_AFGOLD_G_20110216182507.jpg

South Africa is at the forefront of deep mining. Above, workers at AngloGold Ashanti's Mponeng gold mine.
.Not every gold mine can operate at 16,500 feet below the surface, as AngloGold wants to do, but Mr. Cutifani has pulled together a team from about 30 companies, including General Electric Co. and 3M Co., to research technology to allow workers at Mponeng to mine that deep.

Peter Major, an analyst at Cadiz Corporate Solutions, an arm of fund manager Cadiz, in Cape Town, says, "If you were starting a new mine and said you were planning to mine this deep, investors wouldn't have the time for you. But AngloGold has the mines and is already at 4,000 meters (13,200 feet), so it's a different situation."

Digging deeper at Mponeng is likely to be a five-or-more-year project, but if successful it will give the mine another 20 to 30 years of life and competitive costs, says AngloGold's Mr. Cutifani.

Mr. Major says AngloGold has taken analysts on visits to mines, including Mponeng, to show them the viability of mining at increased depths. "By going down another 1,000 meters (3,300 feet) or more, AngloGold's assets are probably worth more than the market is valuing them at," he says.

The company is involved in developing new technologies and mining methods, and Mr. Cutifani says its discoveries will have applications in all deep-level mining.

"There's another 100 million ounces [of gold] in our areas, and our thinking now is how do we get it," Mr. Cutifani says. "It's too big a prize to walk away from. Even if the gold price were lower, we would still do it."

Gold Fields estimates it has about 25 million ounces within reach of three existing operations, without it needing to go considerably deeper or develop new shafts, Mr. Holland says. "We can maintain production at existing mines for at least the next five to 10 years," he says.

The company's Driefontein mine currently operates as deep as 11,550 feet below the surface and may develop that to 12,540 feet, but Mr. Holland doesn't expect to go below 13,200 feet.
Gold Fields at the same time is developing South Deep, a new flagship mine for the company up to 9,900 feet deep with a reserve of roughly 30 million ounces. The mine is fully mechanized, which means that a truck can be driven down shallow declines right to the rock face, and workers can operate remote loaders from a distance.
AngloGold's Mr. Cutifani also says that by increasingly mechanizing operations and having fewer people at the front end of mining work, the company can help cut the number of deaths each year.

The country's largest trade union, the National Union of Mineworkers, is particularly vocal about what it says remains a high death toll in the country's mines despite improvement in recent years. Government figures show that 128 mineworkers died on the job last year, down from 168 the year before and a sharp improvement down from 684 fatalities in 1990.

Gideon du Plessis, deputy general secretary of trade union Solidarity, says AngloGold has given assurances that all mining below 13,200 feet will be fully mechanized, with few mineworkers involved, in order to minimize the danger and that no jobs will be affected by this.

Mr. Major, who spent more than a decade in mining before he became an analyst, remains somewhat skeptical. "I'm not sure just how much benefit there can be from mechanization [at such depths], but any mechanization helps," he says


http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703584804576144062424424614.html

SA's economic growth nears 4%, BER raises 2011 forecast

17th February 2011
TEXT SIZE South Africa’s gross domestic product (GDP) growth accelerated towards 4% quarter-on-quarter in the final three months of 2010, after the economy expanded by 2,6% in the third quarter, the Bureau for Economic Research (BER) said on Thursday.

The fourth-quarter growth would result in the economy expanding by 2,7% for 2010, following the contraction of 1,7% recorded in 2009.

Statistics South Africa is due to release the official fourth-quarter growth figures on Tuesday, ahead of Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan’s Budget speech a day later.

However, the BER pointed out that the growth recovery to date has not been broad based, with robust consumer spending providing most of the impetus, while fixed investment remained poor, albeit slowly gaining traction.

The BER had made an upward revision to the South African GDP growth forecast for 2011 by 0,4 percentage points to 3,8%, mainly resulting from a more optimistic projection of household consumption expenditure, at 4,3%, compared with the 3,7% that was forecast in October 2010.

The result was that gross domestic expenditure, the broadest measure of domestic spending that includes fixed investment, government expenditure and inventory investment, accelerated to a growth of 4,8% during 2011, from a projected 4,3% in 2010.

GDP growth was expected to remain just below 4% at 3,9% for 2012, a marginal upward adjustment from the 3,7% expected previously.

SA has most transparent budget process
February 22 2011 at 06:04am
By Ethel Hazelhurst

South Africa comes top in at least one global ranking. According to Kevin Lings, the economist at Stanlib, a survey of 94 countries which takes place once every two years has ranked the country’s national budgeting process first in terms of transparency and accountability.

The countries included the UK, US, Sweden, Norway, Germany and the Bric countries – Brazil, Russia, India and China.

South Africa’s ranking is in contrast to its performance on the World Economic Forum’s global competitiveness index, where it was placed 54th out of 139 economies in the 2010/11 survey; and the World Bank’s ease of doing business survey benchmarked to June last year, which placed it 34th out of 183.

“The international open budget survey is the world’s only independent and comparative measure of budget transparency,” Lings said.

The criteria used have been developed by the International Monetary Fund, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the International Organisation of Supreme Audit Institutions.

“The average open budget index score for the countries surveyed last year is 42 out of 100. South Africa received a score of 92,” Lings said.

An open budgeting process provides citizens with enough information to understand their national budgets and, according to the report, only 20 of the 94 governments achieved this objective, scoring above 60. About a third of the countries provided some information but less than required. And 41 countries provided “acutely inadequate” information.

Lings said South Africa’s budget process “has improved dramatically over the years, especially after Trevor Manuel became finance minister”. Manuel became finance minister in 1996.

His successor, Pravin Gordhan, had improved the process further, said Lings.

“The documentation has become consistent, transparent and rich in detail, something that was completely lacking prior to 1994,” Lings said.

But he pointed out: “Unfortunately a transparent budgeting process is a necessary but not sufficient condition for effective government.

“Once National Treasury has allocated the funds and set the key expenditure priorities, it is up to each department to deliver an acceptable outcome using the funds available. That is clearly not happening, especially in key areas such as education and health care, but also within many provinces and municipalities.” - Business Report


http://www.iol.co.za/business/business-news/sa-has-most-transparent-budget-process-1.1030065

Pretty good considering the dire predictions for GDP growth a few months back...

SA's economic growth stays on track
Feb 22 2011 12:03

Reuters

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Zuma team accused of wasting billions
Feb 21 2011 14:04

The DA says the Zuma administration has spent almost R4bn on "self-indulgent purchases".

Zuma's son slams rail deal reports
Feb 22 2011 08:09

President Jacob Zuma's son has criticised the "faceless cowards" who claim he will benefit from the state's R550bn rail project.

Govt: Private health killing itself
Feb 21 2011 22:01

Private healthcare groups and "short-sighted" medical schemes are pricing themselves out of existence, says Health Minister Dr Aaron Motsoaledi.

Pretoria - South Africa’s economy grew by 4.4% in the fourth quarter of 2010 on a seasonally adjusted and annualised basis, compared with an upwardly revised 2.7% expansion in the third quarter, data showed on Tuesday.

On an unadjusted year-on-year basis, the economy expanded by 3.8% from a revised 2.7% in the third quarter.

A Reuters poll of 17 economists last week forecast a 4.2% acceleration in gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the fourth quarter on a seasonally adjusted and annualised basis, and a 3.5% rise on a year-on-year unadjusted basis.

Peter Attard Montalto, emerging market analyst at Nomura, said the the figure confirmed that interests rates would be kept on hold.

“Strong trade is showing through with strong agriculture being the main surprise for us. Retail is recovering but more slowly, whilst construction remains weak on the back of lacklustre domestic investment," he said.

“Overall we would say this would confirm rates left on hold and be a touch stronger than South African Reserve Bank (Sarb) was originally looking for. The economy is undergoing a continued recovery and the Sarb was likely too pessimistic about this through much of 2010.

“However, we can see the recovery is still uneven with trade strongest, then consumption and investment taking up the rear. That should come through however into the middle of this year, as low rates pass through and credit conditions start to relax.”

The economy came out of recession in the third quarter of 2009 and analysts say fourth-quarter GDP should reflect some traction in the recovery, after the third quarter number was depressed by labour strikes.

Data from the manufacturing and retail sectors showed positive growth in the last few months of 2010, boding well for the GDP figure.

The Reserve Bank has cut interest rates by a cumulative 650 basis points to a historical low of 5.5% since December 2008, in an attempt to boost growth.

page1

SA infrastructure gets R800bn boost

Pretoria - Government and state-owned enterprises will spend more than R800bn over the next three years on infrastructure, which supports future economic growth while contributing directly to current gross domestic product (GDP).

Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said the money would be spent on new power stations, road networks, dams and water supply pipelines, rain and ports facilities, schools, hospitals and government buildings.

“This builds on the steady progress made over the past decade which saw the contribution of government and public enterprises to gross fixed capital formation rise from 4% of GDP in 2000 to 8.6% in 2009.

"These are long-term investments in the future of our country, and in the capacity of the economy to grow and create jobs for generations to come."

While infrastructure spending in the lead-up to the 2010 Fifa World Cup had assisted in moderating the impact of the recession on South Africa, there had been an apparent deterioration in government construction spending over the past year.

The challenge of intensifying infrastructure spending over the period ahead would require attention to planning, budgeting and contract management in national and provincial departments and municipalities.

According to the budget review, capital expenditure continued to underperform budgeted amounts. Since 2006/7, provincial capital expenditure had averaged about 86% of allocated capital budgets.

The municipal performance had improved from 72% in 2006/07 to 85% in 2008/09, before declining to 80% in 2009/10. State-owned enterprises spent 72% of their capital budgets in 2009/10.

SA infrastructure gets R800bn boost

...


Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said the money would be spent on new power stations, road networks, dams and water supply pipelines, rain and ports facilities, schools, hospitals and government buildings.



Gauteng Provincial Government Precinct and Re Kgabisa Tswane comes to mind.

Budget 2011 - all the numbers

VAT may be raised, budget deficit larger than expected, more cash for education, GDP growth forecast trimmed

DES LATHAM
Published: 2011/02/23 05:47:47 PM


South African Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan says he’s considering raising the VAT rate and has also projected a larger budget deficit than expected for next year.

Gordhan says the deficit until March 2012 will remain at 5.3% of GDP - after last year suggesting that this could drop to around 4,6% next year.

Gordhan has also warned that growth will now be slightly less than expected at 3,4% instead of 3,5%.


Bonds rise on budget 2011

The yield on 15-year government bonds rose about 10 basis points on the news.

The rand was trading at R7.10 to the dollar by 17h00 on Wednesday.


VAT to increase?

The treasury is also pondering the increase of VAT and imposing an additional levy on payroll taxes to fund the planned government health service.

Infrastructure spending up to R800bn

The minister also forecast infrastructure spending to hit R800 billion over the next three years.


Police and Justice to get R12.8bn


An amount of R12.8 billion has been allocated to the departments of police, justice, correctional services and the Independent Complaints Directorate, to help the police in their fight against crime, Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said on Wednesday.


Transport sector receives more money

The transport sector will receive an additional allocation of R10.3 billion over the next three years to improve infrastructure and services, Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said on Wednesday.


Here are some of the main Budget 2011 numbers :


EDUCATION SPENDING 21% OF BUDGET

The education budget rose by 9.7% to R189.5 billion, with the basic education allocation going up by 10.6% to R145.5 billion, and tertiary education by 6.8% to R26 billion.


SOCIAL SPENDING INCREASES 10%

Social protection followed with a budget of R146.9 billion, reflecting an increase of 10.7 percent; housing and community amenities R121.9 billion (up by 19.5 percent); and health R112.6 billion (by 9.8 percent).


PUBLIC ORDER/SAFETY BUDGET UP 8,2%

The public order and safety budget allocation rose by 8.2 percent to R90.9 billion — police R60.7 billion (up 8.5 percent), prisons R16.5 billion (8.6 percent), and justice R13.7 billion (6.2 percent).


DEBT

Net government debt to hit R999bn by the end of the 2011/12 fiscal year and rise to R1.4 trillion, or 39.3 percent of GDP, by 2013/14.


REVENUE

Total government revenue for 2011/12 forecast at R824bn, or 28.3% of GDP. That should rise a fraction to 28.4% and 28.8 percent in the following two years.


SPENDING

Total government expenditure seen at 33.6% of GDP, in line with the previous year’s budget. In 2012/13, it is forecast to drop to 33.2%, and 32.6% in the year after that.


INFRASTRUCTURE

Public sector spending on infrastructure expected to average 8.4% of GDP over the next three years, totaling R808bn.


TAX RECEIPTS

Revised tax revenue for 2010/11 is R672bn, 12.3% higher than the previous year; it is seen rising to R741bn in 2011/12 before reaching R927bn in 2013/14.


JOB CREATION

Government proposes spending R150bn over three years as it tries to create 5 million jobs by 2020.


HIV/Aids

The dedicated HIV/Aids allocation to provinces will increase dramatically over the next three years, according to Budget documents tabled on Wednesday.


Spending on their HIV/Aids conditional grant would rise from R6 billion this year, to R10.6bn in 2013/14, National Treasury said in its Budget Review.


Sin Tax up


Smokers will pay 80 cents more for a packet of cigarettes - while a can of beer will cost them 6.4 cents more, a bottle of wine 13.5 cents and a bottle of sprits R2.86.


Fuel levy up 10c a litre

The general fuel levy will increase by 10 cents a litre of petrol and diesel from April 6th.


State pentions up by R60 a month


State old age pensions will go up by R60 a month, to R1140, with effect from the beginning of April.


More money for housing

An additional R4.9bn will be allocated for housing and municipal services over the next three years


With REUTERS, SAPA



http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=135247

Some interesting titbits here...

------------

South Africa's super-rich
FEB 23, 2011 | SAPA
Over 2,000 South Africans make R5-million plus

More than 2000 South African taxpayers earned more than five million rand each during the 2009/10 tax year, according to a document released by the SA Revenue Service and National Treasury on Wednesday.

One of the tables in the document lists 2009 taxpayers by “taxable income group”, a scale that runs from A to Y.

The Y group includes those who earned R5,000,001-plus between March 1 2009 and the end of February last year.

The table shows this group included 2,046 people, who collectively earned more than R19 billion in taxable income, and were tax assessed to the tune of R7.4 billion.

The W and X groups include those who earned R1,000,001 to R2 million, and R2,000,001 to R5 million respectively during this period.

The W group had 39,372 members, and the X group 11,028.

http://www.sowetanlive.co.za/news/2011/02/23/south-africa-s-super-rich

That is a very solid and forward looking budget.
To actually be able to offer tax cuts of R8bn at a time when countries like the UK are forced to go the other way, is just fantastic, and another indicator that this countries economy is performing well.
Btw, VAT in the UK is now up at 20%!!! That is quite nasty indeed...

The meaningless statements still fascinate me:

EDUCATION SPENDING 21% OF BUDGET

The education budget rose by 9.7% to R189.5 billion, with the basic education allocation going up by 10.6% to R145.5 billion, and tertiary education by 6.8% to R26 billion.

ANC rejects warnings over state pay
Mar 02 2011 06:54


Cape Town - For the second time in as many months ANC parliamentarians have pooh-poohed serious warnings about the country’s current economic direction.

On Tuesday ANC MPs remonstrated with one of South Africa’s top economists for his “exaggerated” figures on job creation, social grants and the future “wealthy” public service.

The economist, Mike Schussler of Economists.co.za, made these assertions in a submission on the national budget to a joint sitting of the parliamentary finance committees.

He sketched a sombre picture of the economy’s ability to meet government’s ambitious job-creation targets and warned about high wage increases in the public service and the little protection afforded small and medium-sized (SME) enterprises.

But these warnings were scorned by the ANC.

Last year ANC MPs also angrily repudiated warnings by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that reform was needed in the country’s wage-negotiation structures if the country was to achieve 6% or 7% growth (to create jobs) in the short term.

Various ANC MPs, including Edwin Chaane, a member from North West, accused Schüssler of exaggerating and using incorrect data.

Schüssler stressed that his information had been based on figures from Statistics South Africa.

The budget tabled by Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan last Wednesday focused on job creation, continued state expenditure on infrastructure and social grants financed from increasing state indebtedness.

This budget needed to manage government’s target of creating five to nine million jobs over the next decade.

Schüssler said South Africa’s public service wages matched those of wealthy countries and were the seventh highest in the world. They were still rising and could soon outdo those of Portugal and France.

Public service remuneration contributes 12% to the gross domestic product (GDP) and accounts for 40% of the R977bn government expenditure in the 2011/12 financial year.

Public service pay and increasing state indebtedness are the two fastest rising budget items.

Gordhan has had to budget almost R40bn more over the next three years owing to wage adjustments.

In 2011 the average individual wage at Eskom will surpass the R500 000 mark, said Schüssler.

This makes South Africa the third best paying country for government institution employers after Sweden and France. High public service earnings are a global trend, but this is quickly changing – not only in South Africa, said Schüssler.

The average monthly public service salary has in recent years continued to be twice that of the private sector.

Public-sector hiring has declined 2.6% over the past four years. In contrast the number of government posts is 15% up.

About 301 000 employers in the SME sector employ four or more people, creating a total of almost seven million positions. This is where the private sector’s job-creation capacity lies, but this group has been swamped by legislation and has declined by 620 000 or 6% since 2000.

Schüssler said to create five million jobs over the next decade the private sector would need to grow 4.9%. The public sector should grow 6.5% and car allowances 13.3%.

To create nine million posts the private sector would need to grow 7.7%, the public sector 10.1% and car allowances 18.8%.

Nowhere in the world has this been possible.

http://www.fin24.com/Economy/Public-service-pay-hikes-too-high-20110302

Finally some idea of the annual value of SA's real estate market. R500bn is pretty impressive!

-------------

Monday Mar 14, 2011
'Transformation in estate agency industry is vital'

With only 6 percent of estate agencies in South Africa owned by black people, transformation of the industry was important, Estate Agency Affairs Board chairman Thami Bolani said.

Addressing Parliament's select committee on trade on Friday about problems faced by the board, he said there were 46 000 operating estate agencies in the country and "only 6 percent are owned by Africans".

"So, high on the list of problems is the issue of transformation."

The board had never had a policy to deal with transformation in the industry, which was worth R500 billion a year.

The board was "attempting" to implement a policy within the next three months that would address transformation issues.

It had appointed a transformation committee and invited representatives from the National Property Forum and the Property Charter to make submissions.

The board had also entered into negotiations with banks, parastatals and the government.

"There will also be involvement of the services Seta and other key role-players and we hope that in the next three months we will be able to produce, for the very first time, a clear transformation policy that will be implemented vigorously and on which we will report regularly to the South African community," Bolani said.

The board would also focus on educating South Africans about the property industry to draw more black people into it.

Other problems the board faced included a lack of clear policy guidelines and strategies about compliance, an increase in the number of people operating without valid Fidelity Fund certificates, and illegal traders.

There was also an increase in the number of fraudulent claims, poor IT infrastructure, poor customer service and poor working conditions.

Bolani said there were between 5 000 and 10 000 unregistered estate agents in the industry and this had led to an increase in the number of claims submitted by consumers who dealt with them.

Sapa


Posted at 08:33AM Mar 14, 2011 by Editor in Market


http://www.iolproperty.co.za/roller/news/entry/transformation_in_estate_agency_industry

Greetings from Russia! Friends, may you help me?

To write a study, I need information about big turn-key general contractors of South Africa, primarily having experince in hotel development (but it is not a must), able to build from ground and concrete works up to complete furnishing.

I think after the World Cup the construction industry should be very strong.

Thank you very much in advance.

SA economy added 101 000 jobs in fourth quarter – Stats SA report
2 COMMENTS | COMMENT PRINT EMAIL |

By: Loni Prinsloo
22nd March 2011

Updated 4 hours agoTEXT SIZE The number of people employed in South Africa’s formal sector rose for the second consecutive quarter in the three months to December, with the economy adding 101 000 jobs in the fourth quarter.

The Quarterly Employment Statistics report, published by Statistics South Africa on Tuesday, showed formal non-agriculture employment rose by 1,2% to 8,256-million in the December quarter, compared with the 8,155-million people employed at the end of the September quarter.

The positive traction over the past two quarters followed 18 months of employment numbers dropping, with almost one-million lost jobs during the economic crisis of 2008/9.

Compared to last year’s December quarterly numbers, employment in the formal, non-agricultural sector increased by 93 000 employees.

The country’s mining and quarrying industry showed strong year-on-year growth in employment, bringing in an additional 15 000 employees. However, quarter-on-quarter, employment declined, with 2 000 jobs lost.

Construction industry employment declined by 3,6% or 15 000 employees in the December 2010 quarter, compared with the December 2009 quarter. StatsSA also reported that 6 000 lost their jobs in the three months from September 2010, to December 2010, mainly owing to the completion of construction projects.

The manufacturing industry increased employment by 0,6% or 7 000 employees in the December quarter compared with the September quarter, after the industry lost 19 000 employees in the last year.

The strongest employment driver between the December 2009 and December 2010 quarters, was the community, social and personal services industry, adding 68 000 employees, mainly owing to increases in employment in provincial, local and national government departments and other government activities.

The financial sector added 26 000 and the wholesale and retail trade sector added 18 000 jobs, when compared to December 2009.

The report also showed that employee salaries in the formal sector generally showed strong increases, rising by 10,7% quarter-on-quarter and 11,4% year-on-year, while the country showed an average inflation rate of between 3% and 4% during the year.

Gordhan: SARS collects R674.2 bln

April 1 2011 at 12:36pm
Independent Newspapers

The SA Revenue Service (SARS) has collected 674.2 billion rand for 2010-11, Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan announced at a media briefing on Friday. Gordhan was accompanied by SARS commissioner Oupa Magashule and other SARS officials.

SARS was given a target of 672.2 billion rand for the fiscal year.

“They've done remarkably well,” Gordhan said. - I-Net Bridge


http://www.iol.co.za/business/business-news/gordhan-sars-collects-r674-2-bln-1.1050803

S.Africa cuts 2010/11 deficit on revenue rise
Fri Apr 1, 2011 10:54am

* Economic recovery leads to higher revenue

* Spending outcome lower than anticipated

* Deficit narrows to 5.0 pct of GDP

PRETORIA, April 1 (Reuters) - South African Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said on Friday the 2010/11 fiscal deficit was 5.0 percent of GDP, slightly lower than initially forecast due to higher-than-expected tax collection.

Gordhan had previously forecast a deficit of 5.3 percent of output for the year ended March 31.

The South African Revenue Service (SARS) collected 674.2 billion rand ($99.61 billion) in revenue, slightly more than the target of 672.2 billion rand, Gordhan said.

"The remarkable performance that SARS is reporting indicates that our economy is recovering," Gordhan said.

The bond market firmed slightly after Gordhan's announcement, with the 2015 bond yield ZAR157= slipping to 7.81 percent from 7.82 and the 2026 yield ZAR186 also retreating one basis point to 8.94 percent.

Gordhan said the economic recovery was expected to continue in the short term, and he reiterated his growth forecast of 3.4 percent for 2011, rising to 4.4 percent by 2013.

He said spending for 2010/11 was 891.3 billion rand, slightly lower than figures anticipated in the 2011 budget. (Reporting by Stella Mapenzauswa, Editing by Ed Cropley)


http://af.reuters.com/article/southAfricaNews/idAFLDE7300NJ20110401

Business confidence at highest level since 2008
Tuesday, 05 April 2011

Business confidence rose in March to its highest level since September 2008, the SA Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Sacci) said on Tuesday.

"The BCI (Business Confidence Index) is 5.1 index points higher than a year ago and is the highest since September 2008 when the BCI stood at 89.9," Sacci said in a statement. The BCI was 88.3 in March 2011 after contracting to 86.4 in February.

"This month's improvement might further enhance the momentum in business confidence as the 88 is indicative of a growing base for more sustainable economic improvement," Sacci said. The chamber said the latest data showed the local economy had established some momentum and remained resilient in the face of global events.

"Business confidence remains sensitive to domestic socio-economic developments. The conduct of the local government elections, the decisiveness with which corruption is dealt with and the level of labour dispute activity will be key determinants of whether the BCI breaches the significant level of 90."

The chamber said it was not clear what effects the Japanese nuclear disaster could have on the world economy. "The effects of the Japanese nuclear disaster are yet unclear and could bear on global energy supplies and costs in the long run."

Employment growth at two year high
Monday, 11 April 2011

Employment grew at its highest level in two years in March according to the latest Adcorp Employment Index released on Monday.

"This is the first time in well over two-and-a-half years that all sectors, occupations and employment types recorded positive growth," Adcorp CEO Richard Pike said in a statement.

Total employment grew by 5.6% in March. The highest employment growth rates were seen in transport at 18.3%, electricity at 13.6% and agriculture at 11.8%. Mining jobs grew 11.5%, professional services at 10.8% and machine operator occupations at 10.4%. Agency employment grew by 9.9%. The index found employment in the official sector grew 7.3% and in the unofficial sector it grew 2%. Temporary work grew by 3.7% during the month, while non-agency temporary work declined.

"This is the first time since January 2006 that the formal sector drew workers out of informal employment," said Pike.

He said in the past decade, South Africa's employment growth had been of a temporary nature. "This is in line with international trends and South Africans still need a shift in mindset around the notions of temporary and permanent employment." he said.

"Since January 2000, traditional permanent employment declined by 20.9% and temporary, contract and other forms of 'atypical' employment increased by 64.1%". This translated into 1.9 millions jobs lost in traditional employment but there were 2.4 million people employed in temporary-type jobs. "Clearly, there is nothing temporary about temporary employment, except in the limited sense that a particular temporary job may not last permanently or indefinitely".

Temporary work was a "natural business response" to technological innovations in the workplace and provided a stop-gap for people entering and exiting the permanent job market, such as youth, retired people, working mothers, and unskilled and inexperienced job-seekers, he said.

that's great news. It seems as if most economies are rebounding with the exception of PIIGS, UK and Japan. Even the US economy is creating some jobs again. However I wonder what will happen to them when QE3 is not implemented and FED starts raising rates...

Oilrig servicing can boost W Cape, create jobs – Alan Winde
|

By: Martin Creamer
11th April 2011

Each oil rig that comes into the port of Saldanha is worth millions of dollars and thousands of jobs to the South African economy, says Western Cape Finance and Economic Development Minister Alan Winde, who would like to see the port of Saldanha create additional capacity for oil-and-gas related activities.

Speaking to Engineering News Online in a video interview at the opening of iron-ore miner Kumba’s new high-technology sampling plant at Saldanha, Winde welcomed the national recognition that South Africa’s latest industrial policy action plan gives to both the oil-and-gas and the boat-building businesses.

“Oil and gas is not about the Western Cape alone, but it’s about South Africa as a whole,” Winde says.

Pointing to an oilrig in the harbour during the visit to Saldanha of Engineering News Online, Winde said that South Africa should aim towards attracting many more of these rigs to Saldanha from the West Coast of Africa.

He also sees the offshore gas resources in South Africa’s Orange River Basin on the Cape West Coast as having the potential to mitigate energy risk for South Africa during the period of build up of the Medupi and Kusile coal-fired power stations, which are currently under construction inland.

In the next five years, the provincial Minister envisages the creation of additional quays at Saldanha for delivery of oil-and-gas services, new facilities to encourage the beneficiation of metals and minerals, and the possible emergence of a manganese export terminal, in addition to the highly utilised iron-ore export terminal.

South Africa last year exported more than 47-million tons of iron-ore from the deep-water port of Saldanha, and has plans to increase the exportation level to 60-million tons in the near term.

Winde says that the Western Cape has convinced national government to support the province’s bid to investigate the economic viability of establishing an industrial development zone (IDZ) in its port region.

The province is currently searching for growth engines to meet its prime objectives of creating economic growth and jobs.

The R10-million IDZ study under way is focusing on the area that extends from the City of Cape Town to Saldanha Bay, which generates 80% of provincial revenue.

Winde welcomes the initiative of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to encourage IDZ development through legislation as well as the DTI’s R15-billion mineral beneficiation vision for the area, and also sees the IDZ as a possible future hub for the manufacture of renewable energy products.

Cape Town Mayor Randall Abdol says that the DTI's announcements have the potential to create 129 000 jobs in the region.

Winde would like IDZ development to be accelerated through the introduction of meaningful incentives.

^^ I like this...it reallys hows that South Africa is at work...The ANC government working hand-in-hand with the DA provincial government.


Winde says that the Western Cape has convinced national government to support the province’s bid to investigate the economic viability of establishing an industrial development zone (IDZ) in its port region.

The province is currently searching for growth engines to meet its prime objectives of creating economic growth and jobs.

The R10-million IDZ study under way is focusing on the area that extends from the City of Cape Town to Saldanha Bay, which generates 80% of provincial revenue.

Winde welcomes the initiative of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to encourage IDZ development through legislation as well as the DTI’s R15-billion mineral beneficiation vision for the area, and also sees the IDZ as a possible future hub for the manufacture of renewable energy products.

Cape Town Mayor Randall Abdol says that the DTI's announcements have the potential to create 129 000 jobs in the region.

SA to invest R102bn to boost industry


By: Reuters
12th April 2011

South Africa's state-owned Industrial Development Corporation will invest R102-billion over the next five years to improve the industrial sector, Economic Development Minister Ebrahim Patel said on Tuesday.

Patel said during a budget vote speech in parliament that he expected the IDC also to consider setting up a distressed sector fund to help shield South African companies from the strong rand – which has gained almost 30% against the dollar since the start of 2009.

State spending spurs growth in provinces
May 12 2011 08:35

Bloemfontein - In March provincial government departments went all out to use up their budgets before the end of the financial year.

The Sake24 and BoE Private Clients provincial barometers, which measure the economic pulse of the provinces, showed massive increases in the sub-indices reflecting government expenditure.

The highest increase was in the Eastern Cape, where March state expenditure was an enormous 60.5% higher than in March 2010. This boosted the province’s overall growth index by 19% – the highest increase to date for that province’s barometer.

KwaZulu-Natal (43.1% up), Gauteng (26.6%), the Western Cape (25.3%), and the Free State (20%) also indicated how effective public servants could be.

Economists.co.za economist Mike Schüssler, the compiler of the provincial barometers, said expenditure by national government reached a high of R55bn in March, a trend that he ascribed to departments using the last month of their financial year to deplete their budgets.

Schüssler warned that such spending was certainly not sustainable. He said he was not worried if government overspent now and then, but the economy had begun to recover and government could actually take a step back now.

The healthy improvements in the overall provincial barometers also continued, indicating that the country’s economic recovery is still gaining momentum.

In March the Eastern Cape Barometer was 24.5% up, to 123 index points, and the KwaZulu-Natal (15.8% to 123.1 points), Gauteng (14.3% to 105.5 points) and Western Cape (11.5% to 112.6 points) barometers also did considerably better.

This indicates that economic activity levels in these provinces are systematically improving and that the future increasingly looks brighter.

The private-sector economy is also back in the picture and the transport and communications indices, in particular, are doing well.

In March cellphone use throughout the country was 37% up, and internet use 36%.

The supposition is that the growing popularity and availability of smart phones is contributing to increased cellphones and data services usage. Over the same period there was a 7% decline in fixed-line calls.

Good news for the company is that the volatile construction index could again be showing a positive turnaround. After months of strong declines in most provinces, it is only in the Eastern Cape (-22.9%) and Gauteng (-19.6%) that activity levels are still low.

Yet the construction sub-indices indicate that business may be doing a u-turn and that activity levels are edging up.

- Sake24

I just came across this great website: http://www.tradeinvestsa.co.za/

there are tons of business and investment opportunities listed on there, all over SA :banana:

Considering the shody treatment Trevor has recieved in recent times at the ANC, is it time for him to move on?

Manuel for top IMF job?Wed, 18 May 2011 3:50

The International Monetary Fund's new managing director should come from a developing country, Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said on Wednesday.

"Institutions such as the IMF must reform so that they can become credible," Gordhan said in a statement.

The only way that could happen, was if it reflected the interests of "all countries".

"South Africa calls for a candidate from a developing country to be given the opportunity to be the managing director of the IMF. Such a candidate will bring a new perspective that will ensure that the interests of all countries, both developed and developing, are fully reflected in the operations and policies of the IMF."

He said there were candidates from several developing countries who were "credible" and "eminently suitable" to run the organisation.

On Tuesday, Fin24 reported that National Planning Commission head Trevor Manuel could emerge as a candidate to replace International Monetary Fund (IMF) chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn. Although Strauss-Kahn had not formally stepped down, he was arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting a hotel cleaner in New York.

Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sloan School of Management and former IMF chief economist, Simon Johnson, told Fin24 Manuel was hotly-tipped as a possible successor.

He said if the Brics group of emerging countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and SA) agreed on a candidate, that person could become a front-runner to head the IMF.

He has been offered several UN positions. At one stage he was meant to make London his base. I assume marrying Maria changed that.

Some say he still prefers a more UN-centric role but IMF may be right up his ally.

Wal-Mart deal signals growing American business interest in Africa, US official asserts

The decision by Wal-Mart to invest $2.3-billion to buy 51% of JSE-listed retailer Massmart epitomised a growing enthusiasm among US firms for South African and African business prospects, US Assistant Secretary of State for Economic, Energy and Business Affairs Jose Fernandez has argued.

Speaking on 'Africa in the US Policy Landscape' at the Gordon Institute of Business Science, in Johannesburg, on Monday, Fernandez said the US government and American companies were increasingly "eager" to pursue opportunities in Africa, but were also increasingly aware that the competitive pressures were rising, not only from Europe, but also from emerging-market giants such as China, India and Brazil.

Nevertheless, the rise of the African consumer and the emergence of 300-million middle class citizens (albeit many who were at the lower end of that strata and still vulnerable) was beginning to attract US interest from the likes of Wal-Mart, "who are no fools" - the group's foreign revenues had risen from close to zero to 25%.

He acknowledged that having 600 US firms operational in South Africa was "not enough", but said that interest and investment would definitely expand further as Africa grew from a $1.6-trillion gross domestic product (GDP) region to an above $2-trillion GDP region by 2020. And, as the purchasing power of the African consumer grew from the current level of $900-billion to $1.4-trillion over the same period.

That purchasing power was currently being overshadowed by the emphasis given to Africa's natural resources potential. But US figures showed that only 24% of the continent's GDP currently arose from resources, with the balance comprising the wholesale and retail trade, transport, telecoms and manufacturing.

Investors were also conscious of this potential, which was why foreign direct investment had risen from $9-billion in 2000 to $64-billion in 2008.

However, while US investors were "ready" to increase their participation, they also remained concerned about ongoing political instability in some countries, as well as poor governance and corruption, with corruption estimated to be costing the continent $150-billion yearly, or 20% in added costs.

Corruption was, thus a key constraint for US companies, especially small and medium enterprises, which did not have access to the legal resources major enterprises used to set up safeguards.

President Barack Obama's administration was also keen to extend the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act's trade preferences beyond the 2015 cut off, but it was concerned that the legislation was still not attracting the levels of trade anticipated and might, thus, need amending.

Fernandez said the US was also wary of losing relative competitiveness to the likes of the European Union, whose Economic Partnership Agreements with African countries would improve market access for European firms at the expense of US companies. Moreover, it was closely monitoring progress being made in Africa by China, India, Brazil and others.

"Competition is intensifying," he concluded.

IMF says SA economy to grow even faster

June 20 2011 at 06:04am
By Ethel Hazelhurst

South Africa’s growth outlook has been upgraded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In its World Economic Outlook (WEO), released on Friday, the institution raised its April estimate of 3.5 percent for the current year by a half percentage point to 4 percent and next year’s estimate from 3.8 percent to 4.2 percent.

In February, the Treasury predicted growth of 3.4 percent this year, while recent forecasts by private sector economists have ranged between 3 percent and 3.8 percent.

The improved outlook is in contrast to the downgrading of the prospects of the advanced economies – by 0.2 percentage points; and it exceeds the 0.1 percentage point upgrade of emerging and developing economies as a whole.

The IMF sliced 0.1 percentage points off its world forecast to 4.3 percent.

Alfredo Cuevas, the IMF representative in South Africa, said South Africa’s upgrade followed the recent visit by an IMF team to the country and the Statistics SA report that the economy grew a surprise 4.8 percent between January and March, after expanding by an upwardly revised 4.5 percent in the previous three months. The figures represent quarter-on-quarter changes, which have been adjusted for seasonal factors and multiplied by four to show an annualised trend.

There were no changes in the IMF forecasts for China and India from the April estimates of 9.6 percent and 8.2 percent, respectively.

Commenting on the “mild slowdown of the global expansion”, the WEO highlighted weakness in the US economy and concerns about government finances in some euro zone countries. It said volatile markets reflected concerns about sovereign risks.

It referred to “negative surprises” including supply disruptions in Japan following an earthquake and tsunami. But it noted in contrast growth surprised on the upside in the euro area “powered by more upbeat investment in Germany and France”.

However, the IMF’s concern about potential debt default was underscored last week, when rating agency Standard & Poor’s cut Greece’s credit rating three notches to CCC, saying the country was likely to default on its debts at least once by 2013, according to AFP.

Bloomberg reported Greece might need up to e45 billion (R435bn) in new loans to avoid a default. This comes after a e110bn lifeline last year from European states and the IMF.

Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou is battling to keep his government afloat, after a cabinet reshuffle, as euro zone finance ministers met at the weekend to discuss the problems.

Perceptions of risk rose and stock markets fell at the start of the trading day on Friday. The JSE all share index dropped from more than 31 000 to a low of 30 458.9 before regaining some ground to close at 30 669.

While fallout from Europe’s problems has a knock-on effect on global markets, South Africa’s financial position is relatively sound. Moody’s Investors Service said on Friday: “South Africa’s A3 government ratings and stable outlook reflect a combination of prudent economic policies that have improved its debt dynamics considerably over the past decade plus a number of ongoing socioeconomic challenges that are likely to constrain the rating at this level for the foreseeable future.” - Business Report


http://www.eprop.co.za/news/article.aspx?idArticle=13754

Infrastructure renewal

17 Jun 2011 - I-Net Bridge -

Intro
A nation’s physical infrastructure is one of the best indicators of its likely prosperity, infrastructure is a requirement for economic growth and prosperity.

Razina Munshi

Mining investment will lead the charge

Overall investment levels are low

“In our mining division, we will have to turn work away if it continues at this pace”

— MARIUS HEYNS

A nation’s physical infrastructure is one of the best indicators of its likely prosperity. Infrastructure is a requirement for economic growth and prosperity. Investment in infrastructure creates jobs and stimulates economic growth.

The erratic nature of recent government spending on infrastructure development in SA, however, has caused investment to drop.

Large government projects the size of the Gautrain and the 2010 soccer World Cup infrastructure, such as stadiums, have petered out. The recession and resultant squeeze in financial markets have made sourcing capital harder than before. Skills shortages at municipal and provincial level have compounded the problem, causing bottlenecks.

In this environment, a lot has changed for industry players, particularly for the construction sector, which was the largest beneficiary of these high levels of investment.

But in spite of the gloom, some industry players are optimistic. “In our mining division, we will have to turn work away if it continues at this pace,” says Basil Read CEO Marius Heyns.

He insists that there is available work in the sector. But competition has forced margins sharply lower than they were four years ago.

A more competitive construction industry has made strategy and good management critical, to the benefit of firms like Basil Read and Stefanutti Stocks.

But even then, Heyns says infrastructure spending has dropped dramatically, taking the entire sector’s profits with it.

However, lower margins benefit government, which, according to public enterprises minister Malusi Gigaba, has an estimated R1,5trillion infrastructure investment backlog. Between 2005 and 2007, the SA National Roads Agency (Sanral) was forced to accept tenders at extremely high margins. Fierce competition has changed that.

There is far more competition for road construction today, a benefit government should take advantage of.

Government still hopes to spend R808bn on its infrastructure investment programme over the next three years. The largest portion of this falls within Gigaba’s portfolio. State-owned enterprises have been the biggest spenders in recent years, overtaking private-sector investment, which slumped during the recession. It has also soared above general government spending.

But despite its spending ambitions, few large projects have been announced by government recently, slowing its overall contribution to real fixed investment – or gross fixed capital formation (GFCF).

Overall GFCF, which includes general government, public enterprises and the private sector, rose to 15% in 2008, only for it to drop thereafter. On an annual basis, real GFCF contracted by 3,7% in 2010, and its prospects for 2011 are mixed.

Though private-sector spending has increased slightly, bottlenecks are still holding up government infrastructure projects.

GDP growth in the first quarter of 2011 increased above expectations, but growth in the construction sector was completely flat, indicating that investment levels in the economy are very low.

Employment in the construction sector is also a direct beneficiary of higher investment. Construction is one of the sectors identified by government for its contribution to job creation. But its employment levels have dipped.

Despite the drop in actual investment, there is no shortage of plans. Stateowned enterprises, in particular Eskom and Transnet, have extensive spending programmes. Projects in the telecommunications and water sectors have also received attention.

But funding has been one of government’s biggest hurdles.

Investec economist Annabel Bishop says government will source its funding from three main areas: internally generated resources (42%); government funding (5%); and long- and short-term borrowing in domestic (28%) and foreign (25%) markets.

Consumers are already paying significantly higher tariffs (such as the 25%/annum increase in the electricity price and expected increases in other tariffs like toll roads) to finance the construction of infrastructure.

Electricity tariff hikes will reflect the costs of electricity provision, giving Eskom a consistent revenue stream. Consumers are now paying for the Medupi and Kusile power stations.

Gigaba has recently said public enterprises such as Transnet would tap into new sources of funding in a bid to increase the capacity on key commodity export corridors.

Before the recession, government investment rose dramatically, resulting in a general improvement in the state of infrastructure. The soccer World Cup, in particular, forced local and national government to improve the condition of large national assets such as airports, roads and ports.

A recent assessment by the SA Institution of Civil Engineering shows that national assets have benefited from considerable investment.

Airport infrastructure, for example, is in excellent condition, after a R17bn investment injection from the Airports Company of SA. OR Tambo International was recently named the best airport in Africa at a global awards ceremony.

The condition of rail infrastructure for heavy-haul freight lines has also improved. Good maintenance and capital investment have enhanced the network. Unfortunately other rail infrastructure has been neglected, causing the movement of goods to move from rail to road.

Transnet’s investment programme, however, is designed to reverse this trend, by returning freight to rail.

Rapid-rail projects are also firmly on the agenda. A proposed high-speed railway project between Johannesburg and Durban has been mooted by the department of transport, at an estimated cost of R560bn.

The Passenger Rail Agency of SA will also embark on an 18-year programme to replace its coach and locomotive fleet, at an estimated cost of R86bn.

National roads managed by Sanral are also highly rated infrastructure. Government has also broadened the agency’s mandate. The network of roads that it is responsible for has increased to include some provincial roads. This was done in a bid to counter slow investment at provincial government level.

However, the Institution of Civil Engineering’s assessment raises concerns about the state of disrepair of social infrastructure, which serves the majority of people. Basic infrastructure such as sanitation, waste-management, water, health and public education facilities are in a state of decline.

For example, some sanitation infrastructure and gravel roads outside urban areas have deteriorated to such an extent that they are unfit for their intended purpose, or are on the verge of failure. Gravel roads constitute 75% of SA’s road network.

The evaluation also points out that greater investment has not been matched with an equal commitment to maintenance.

Endemic underspending is part of the problem. In the 2009/2010 financial year, municipal government authorities failed to spend 17c out of every rand budgeted for capital expenditure, according to national treasury. With this trend also visible at national and provincial government level, the problem has become critical.

Government has adopted steps to address the problem. Treasury is developing a strategy to appraise public-sector projects. National departments are also building capacity in provinces to ensure that projects are run effectively.

And for municipalities, the department of co-operative governance is establishing a specialist support unit to help plan and contract large capital projects.

Government has emphasised that building new and maintaining existing infrastructure is a key element of its aim to create 5m jobs over the next 10 years.

As public awareness of deteriorating or dysfunctional infrastructure has risen, the added pressure has forced government to respond more positively.

In this environment, private funding of infrastructure may become more important. Government has voiced support for public-private partnerships (PPP), but delays have prompted a number of firms, such as Stefanutti Stocks, to scale back their PPP units.

PPPs for hospitals and prisons are still awaiting announcement by government. Government’s flagship project, the R4bn upgrade of Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto, for example, has been five years in the making.

The Wild Coast toll road and the N1N2 Winelands road both faced delays because of environmental and social concerns, though tenders for the Winelands project were finally issued at the end of last year.

Innovative funding models are also important at the level of smaller projects. In the Free State province, for example, authorities have asked construction companies to design, finance and construct roads in the province in an attempt to stem its rising backlog.

The initiative has helped the province to start addressing the condition of its roads. The Free State government is responsible for 6370km of tarred and 22179km of gravel road, and most of it is in a poor state and requires urgent rehabilitation. It also has to grapple with damages claims worth millions of rand from commuters affected by bad roads.

With this strategy, the province has begun to deal with its budget shortfalls, work around its critical shortage of skilled professionals as well as reduce the road repair backlog.

About R3,9bn in tenders for 23 projects has already been awarded, and construction is in progress.

Municipalities, despite their constraints, are faced with the most urgent construction and maintenance work. Though private intervention such as the one in the Free State could be a solution, it has not been used effectively.

The private sector, which is traditionally the biggest contributor to fixed investment in SA, has also been a slow spender. Nedbank’s most recent capital projects listing shows that just 53 new projects worth over R20m were announced in 2010, valued at R52,9bn. This is down from 55 projects pursued in 2009, valued at R76,7bn, a 31% decline in investment.

This is a drop from a peak of 80 projects announced in the six months to June 2008, at a cumulative value of R336,1bn. When the recession hit, firms responded by scrapping or postponing their capex plans.

Since then, large new projects have dropped, causing overall investment activity to plunge.

Investec’s Bishop says factors that could negatively affect private-sector investment include further escalations in living costs, which would reduce disposable incomes and hence the need for companies to expand capacity (and increase employment).

But there are signs of activity, and local and international mining houses appear to be leading the charge.

Rising commodity prices have caused a flood of new mining investments, and more are expected, particularly in other African countries. They will need mine infrastructure, as well as basic supporting infrastructure.

An iron ore mine in Sierra Leone for example, requires the construction of a railway line, supporting roads, and even housing. Many of the contracts have been snatched by local construction firms like Basil Read and WBHO.

Subcontinental projects are also on the agenda. Government intends to champion an infrastructure development corridor, to improve the regional transport network. A new railway link between Gauteng and the Namibian port of Walvis Bay is one project that has been supported under this initiative.

A public-private partnership network was also launched recently under the Southern African Development Community to enhance public-sector capacity to integrate private-sector investment in infrastructure in the region.

The launch of new equity funds, backed mostly by foreign investors who want to invest in infrastructure in Africa, could become a resource for African governments. Infrastructure funds provide technical and commercial skills to a project and are able to energise and structure projects at an early stage.

Ultimately, the urgency for investment will increase the pressure to spend. That failing infrastructure in SA is most evident at municipalities crippled by skills shortages, won’t make it any easier. But with better intervention by national government authorities, the critical decline can be halted.

Source: Financial Mail

http://www.eprop.co.za/news/article.aspx?idArticle=13754

African mega-treaty 'to funnel free-trade fortunes into SA'
CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA
Jun 13 2011 19:48

The planned creation of a 26-nation African Tripartite Free Trade Area (FTA) will draw industrial investment to South Africa by making it a springboard for low-duty access to other parts of the continent, trade and industry director general Lionel October said on Monday.

"From the private sector side, two of the big markets in this FTA [are] Egypt and Kenya and if they can then get duty-free access into those markets in north and central Africa then South Africa becomes a production base," he told a media briefing in Cape Town.

"Currently, [most of the exporters coming from Europe or Asia] pay big duties on that and that (benefit) kicks in then immediately because of the bigger volumes. We begin to crack the numbers ... so I think the benefits from investment [kick] in immediately because of the prospects of a big market."

October said the announcement this weekend of the establishment of the free trade zone by 2013 would "absolutely" enhance South Africa's weight within the Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) group of emerging markets.

"We will no longer be a pimple."

The proposed free trade zone will merge the three regional blocs covering southern, central and eastern Africa.

These are the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa), and the East African Community (EAC), which have a combined population of 580-million people.

Global development
Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies said the move to cut barriers in an area stretching from Cape Town to Cairo made sense in terms of global development trends.

He pointed to the "very significant contribution" their big internal markets made to the development of India and China.

"A free trade area across big areas ... is very much compatible with what is needed at this stage of the development of the world economy which we find ourselves in. It is very compatible with what successful developing countries are doing.

"Having large and significant internal markets and the development of those are a significant requirement of their growth processes."

Davies said integration would enhance Africa's chances of capitalising on the two drivers of its faster growth rates -- the mineral boom and the growth in the domestic market.

"As individual countries, the prospects of that are limited. As regions, the process starts to crack the numbers that make some significant sense."

He said that merely lowering tariffs would not give regional trade enough of a boost.

Inter-regional trade
The free trade deal was, therefore, only one leg of a complex process to promote inter-regional trade, which currently accounts for only 10% of total African trade, and to integrate development within Africa.

Commitments made at the weekend's summit of leaders of SADC, EAC, and Comesa also saw an agreement to jointly develop infrastructure and to co-operate on industrial development.

Also part of negotiations are plans to facilitate the movement of business people between African countries, which Davies said was hampered by regulations aimed at deterring crime and illegal immigration.

"We need to make that much easier, so that when people come to trade, to invest that is much easier. That's what has been agreed upon," he said.

Davies said tariff liberalisation would be "substantial" and might be phased in.

Observiing local customs
He dismissed concerns that it could starve some smaller African nations of one of their main sources of fiscal revenue.

"Many countries are trying to reduce their reliance on customs duties. Custom duties are an incredibly volatile source of revenue, that is the problem. If trade takes a dip, the customs revenue takes a huge dip.

"That is the problem that is confronting some of our neighbours and their fiscal situations, those that are the most dependent on [Southern African Customs Union (Sacu)] revenue have been the most affected by the fact that there was a very significant drop in Sacu revenue during the recession.

"I haven't heard anybody raise this as an objection to the FTA." -- Sapa


http://mg.co.za/article/2011-06-13-freetrade-africa-megatreaty-will-funnel-fortunes-into-sa

Germany: SA is top African partner
Jul 04 2011 21:35

Sapa

SAA rebrands for Mandela Day
Jul 04 2011 16:27

South African Airways has unveiled the first aircraft in its fleet to be branded with the Nelson Mandela Day logo, ahead of the anti-apartheid icon's 93rd birthday.


Johannesburg - South Africa is "trade partner number one" for Germany in Africa, Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said during a visit by his South African counterpart on Monday.

"We're not just economically bound, South Africa is also a strategic political partner for us," said Westerwelle. "We work very closely together and not just because we're both currently members of the United Nations Security Council."

Germany was a "top foreign investor" in South Africa, Westerwelle's counterpart Maite Nkoana-Mashabane added. "We appreciate the role that Germany continues to play to support South Africa in helping in our quest to keep Africa as a zone of peace, security and development."

Talks between the ministers focused on South Sudan, Libya and Syria, they said at a joint press conference in Berlin.

South Sudan voted to split from the north in a referendum earlier this year and is scheduled to become a fully-fledged sovereign nation on Saturday.

Africa and the African Union would play an important role in accompanying the new state, and South Africa had already taken a "leading role" in the process, Westerwelle said. Germany is chairing the Security Council during July.

The council decided last week to send 4 200 troops to the border region of Abyei, which both sides are claiming due to its wealth of natural resources.

Meanwhile, a "political solution not necessarily a military solution" was the answer to the situation in Libya, both ministers had agreed, said Nkoana-Mashabane.

The ministers wanted to continue their discussion on Syria, to see "if they could help civilians to help themselves to resolve their political situation in a peaceful manner," she continued.

Nkoana-Mashabane also co-chaired a two-day conference on climate change during the visit, in preparation for the next United Nations summit in South Africa in November

Great News About SA's manufacturing sector. I believe the manufacturing sector will be the fastest growing sector of SA's economy over the next decade, Patel and Davies industrial policies are definitely starting to bear fruit

Korean firms to build plants in SA
The huge South Korean investment in SA could result in thousands of job opportunities for South Africans
LOYISO LANGENI and MARK ALLIX
Published: 2011/07/08 06:40:00 AM


SEVERAL South Korean companies are planning to establish multibillion-rand manufacturing plants in SA, boosting the Asian manufacturing powerhouse’s presence in SA’s economy.



Steel firm Posco, electronics group LG, Hankook Tyre, and Korean Trade Insurance will all set up base in Gauteng.

HSG, a manufacturer of heavy metal components, has chosen Richards Bay as its regional headquarters, to target shipping.

The deals were concluded at the three-day Korean trade exhibition in Sandton, which ended on Wednesday.


The huge South Korean investment in SA could result in thousands of job opportunities for South Africans.

South Korean President Lee Myung-bak was in Durban this week to celebrate the International Olympic Committee’s decision that his country would host the 2018 Winter Olympics. -




"There’s a recognition from South Korean companies that Africa presents profitable opportunities, hence we chose SA to host the first ever Korean trade exhibition on the continent," said Byung-Sam Kim, director-general for Africa at the Korean Trade and Investment Promotion Agency.

A study released on Tuesday by the African Development Bank showed that South Korea was among Africa’s top five trading partners. China commanded the biggest share of the African market, accounting for 38% of the continent’s total trade with emerging countries. This was followed by India at 14,1%, South Korea at 7,2%, Brazil at 7,1% and Turkey at 6,5%.

South Korea’s primary steel maker, Posco, announced yesterday that it had bought out Samancor’s 50% holding in their Poschrome joint venture in SA, taking 100% control.


Samancor is the world’s second-largest ferrochrome maker, with annual output of about 1,3- million tons. The product is used widely in making steel alloys and stainless steel.

Samancor was yesterday unable to confirm reports of the deal in the South Korean media. A company spokesman said its CEO, Jurgen Schalamon, was on a trip, and only he was authorised to speak on the subject.


"I think this is indicative of the quality of chrome ore that we have in SA … and the potential for SA to expand not only chrome ore production, but ferrochrome production as well," Abdul Davids, head of research at Kagiso Asset Management, said yesterday.


The deal would probably benefit Johannesburg-listed Merafe Resources, through its 20,5% stake in the Xstrata-Merafe Chrome venture, the biggest producer of ferrochrome in the world, he said.

Posco chairman Chung Joon- yang had this year visited Kenya, Tanzania and Zimbabwe to secure stable sources of ferrochrome, and negotiate Posco’s role in national development and infrastructure projects, South Korean media reported yesterday.

He also visited the Kalagadi manganese mine development and Kumba Iron Ore’s Sishen mine in the Northern Cape , to discuss co-operation between the companies. Posco has an 11,36% interest in Kalagadi’s manganese project, which is 80% owned by Kalahari Resources, a black- owned company led by women, and 20% by SA’s Industrial Development Corporation.



SA supplies more than 50% of high-quality "charge chrome" for the global stainless steel industry. More than 80% of Samancor’s chrome-ore output is consumed in the production of ferrochrome in SA. The remainder is exported.



About 85% of SA’s chrome alloy production is exported to stainless steel producers across the globe.



Samancor was delisted from the JSE in 1998 when it was bought out by BHP Billiton and Anglo American. In late 2009, International Mineral Resources, which operates in Ukraine and Russia, became the majority shareholder, with a 70% direct shareholding in Kermas SA.


Automitive investment explodes

Vehicle investment to hit the road running
Tata Motors’ new plant at Pretoria will boost local confidence, writes Alexander Parker

Published: 2011/07/08 07:51:24 AM


NEWS that Tata Motors, the low-cost automotive arm of India’s diverse Tata industrial empire, will begin work on an assembly plant in Pretoria, will no doubt be widely welcomed as a statement of confidence in SA and not least as a boost for jobs in Gauteng.
However, if all goes to plan, similar announcements from other motor manufacturers are likely to be heard in the coming year. Yesterday’s revelation that Nissan SA is planning to assemble a minibus taxi in the country is a further example of an industrialisation drive in the motor industry.


The news about Tata’s investment — the size and nature of which are still under wraps — comes when several motor companies are considering significant investments as a result of interventions by the state to attract such automotive investment.

As such, it is quite possible that corks were popped at the Department of Trade and Industry when Tata announced its decision. The department is at the heart of what is going on.

The department has begun seeking further investment outside of the current Automotive Production Development Programme (APDP), which focuses specifically on passenger cars, and which offers Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen, BMW, Toyota, Ford and Nissan a regulatory environment that allows for the mass-production of cars.


In terms of the APDP any passenger car manufacturer who produces 50000 units or more a year can import 20% of their components duty-free.


In other words, the government wants trucks and buses to be built here too.


Negotiations between the vehicle manufacturers, under the auspices of the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of SA (Naamsa), the component manufacturers, under the auspices of the National Association of Automotive Component and Allied Manufacturers (Naacam), the trade unions and the department have been in play for months.

Johan Cloete, director of Automotive Investment Holdings, who is consulting for the department on the matter, says the state is "working on a support package" for the production of medium and heavy commercial vehicles.

He says the resulting deal, which "should be ready for the fourth quarter", could either be incorporated into the APDP or be a "stand- alone package".

The department’s director- general, Lionel October, says that the "broad thrust" is that the department wants to help the original equipment manufacturers to compete. "The key thing is to get the balance right. We have to offer incentives in terms of a production allowance and a rebate on imports," Mr October says. He says there is "big demand" for bigger vehicles and "most are imported". He says municipalities, the Department of Transport and parastatals all buy larger vehicles.

Mkhululi Mlota, head of the automotive customised sector programme at the Department of trade and industry, confirms that negotiations have been running "since last year. We looked to see what potential for growth and expansion existed."



Mr Mlota confirms that Toyota is also in late stages of negotiations with the department to begin taxi manufacturing in SA.


Along with Nissan and Toyota, he says "Chinese manufacturers, and other manufacturers linked to China" (a possible reference to Johannesburg-based Calibra Motor Corporation’s claimed plan to build a factory in Harrismith) are involved in talks with a specific interest in exporting products to sub-Saharan Africa. With regard to larger vehicles, and specifically buses, the department was looking to "ensure the leverage of government procurement".



Mr Mlota says that the state is by far the biggest customer for large buses, and that even those private entities that buy buses are usually "contracted by the state".


As a result, the government needs to offer a guaranteed market to a bus manufacturer "in order that we can industrialise" in SA. "It’s not that easy, but it can be done," Mr Mlota says.



"Various arms of government currently make their own procurement decisions."

He says that three bus manufacturers "have shown interest" and that the rest were "watching closely".

Mr October says one of the reasons talks are delayed is "tension" between Naamsa and Naacam, with the latter wanting certain guaranteed levels of local content in vehicles manufactured in SA.

Once these issues have been ironed out, SA could be on the verge of a significant wave of investment to construct the infrastructure for the manufacture of yet more trucks, taxis and buses locally, and the establishment of SA as the automotive industrial gateway into growing African markets for manufacturers of bakkies, trucks, taxis and buses. This could well have a significant effect on job creation and skills development


source: www.businessday.co.za

Do you know, I was watching the South Koreans celebrate being awarded the 2018 winter games, and how they thought of Durban as lucky for them, after the world cup and winning the right to host the games.

And I thought - I bet you we will see a surge of interest in SA from South Korea!

And here it is. I am telling you, this is partly because the world cup would have reassured them that South Africa was stable and up for it, and because this IOC meeting is in Durban and once again things have gone well for them.

Sport really is helping SA!

^^I actually wanted to put that in the post but I resisted. But the synergies between sports and investment are amazing, no wonder the Brits and others want to monopolise these events. Anyways I'm always amazed at how there's always something happening in SA. The SA economy is going to amaze a lot of people over the coming decade and if you're not ready to get your slice of the pie because you're too busy moaning about ANC, BEE, Sky-is-falling, Zim 2.0, malema, zille etc then that's your fault. Let's get it!!

Rumours of Kansai setting up a base in Cape Town.

Western Cape economy set to benefit from major oil find off Namibian coast

July 8 2011 at 08:59am

http://www.capetimes.co.za/polopoly_fs/ct-oil-rig-8606-1.1095551%21/image/1543300651.jpg_gen/derivatives/box_300/1543300651.jpg inlsa
An oil rige berthed in Cape Town Harbour. The discovery of huge reserves, estimated at 11 billion barrels, off the Namibian coast is set to bring new opportunities locally for engineering industries. Photo: Cindy Waxa

Staff Writer
A MAJOR oil find off the Namibian coast could substantially benefit the Western Cape economy before planned production in 2015.
Namibia’s Mines and Energy Minister, Isak Katali, announced the find, expected to yield 11 billion barrels of oil reserves.
Adrian Strydom, an executive with the SA Oil and Gas Alliance (Saoga) tasked with skills development and training, said:
“If it’s legitimate, it will have a huge impact on the Western Cape because of the service hub we’ve been able to establish (here).”
A recent study commissioned by Saoga indicated that the West African offshore oil and gas market would expand strongly between 2009 and 2013, with expected investment in the maintenance and repair operations in those five years to accumulate to more than $150 billion.
Although the Western Cape does not yet have the required skills, Strydom said the “lead time” of four years would give the industry time to expand the skills base, but funding was needed for this.
He said South Africa was favourably suited to benefit from the African oil and gas industry.
“Africa will become an important oil and gas source and that will benefit us,” said Strydom.
The president of the Cape Chamber of Commerce, Michael Bagraim, declared the discovery a “game-changer” that would benefit the nearest industrial ports in Cape Town and Saldanha.
“It will bring new opportunities for engineering industries servicing the oil rigs and production facilities. It will mean more jobs for the Western Cape and the growth of the Namibian economy, as the foreign investment pours in. (It) will also create trading opportunities.
“Perhaps even more significant
is that the discovery gives credence to the theory that the West African oil fields extend southwards into our waters. It also means further gas discoveries are likely and the potential for efficient gas-fired power stations in the Western Cape is enhanced,” Bagraim said.
Table Bay port manager Sanjay Goven said the port was stretched to capacity.
“There’s no doubt that when it comes to oil rigs and larger vessels, we don’t have enough quayside space.”
According to the provincial government, a single repair job on a vessel typically generated more than R200 million for the regional economy, employing around 2 000 people.
“We’ve been asking the industry to look at Saldanha because we’re completely hemmed in,” Goven said.
Expanding the port by building another quay would not make “business sense”.
“Saldanha has space, but no- one wants to go there because all the engineering companies and suppliers are based in Cape Town,” Goven said.

SA exhibiting 'safe have' qualities - This is true I've noticed it myself, the rand is much less volatile than in the past, it is mostly range bound nowadays.

By Phumza Macanda JOHANNESBURG, July 8 (Reuters) - The threat of mass
contagion from the Greek debt crisis is undermining the
traditional wisdom that, in turbulent times, developed market
assets are a safer bet than their emerging counterparts. While rich countries are grappling with yawning budget
deficits and overall debt levels of 100 percent or more of GDP,
younger states with more sober debt profiles, such as South
Africa, are beginning to appear a more secure bet. Despite earlier worries that the end of ultra-loose monetary
policy in the U.S. could slow capital to emerging markets,
offshore interest in South African domestic debt -- especially
long-dated paper -- has picked up over the last month. The spread between the domestic 30-year bond and its U.S.
equivalent has fallen 20 basis points in the past two weeks. "If you look at the European situation, they are getting
downgraded all the time. There are even rumours that the U.S.
could lose some of its sovereign ratings status as well," said
Ion de Vleeschauwer, chief dealer at Bidvest Bank. "You can buy Portuguese bonds yielding more than South
African bonds but there's that threat of default, so guys are
steering away from developed bonds and trying to find value
elsewhere," he added. South Africa's budget deficit stands at 5.0 percent of GDP
and its overall debt is around 40 percent of output, making sure
its investment grade credit rating remains secure. Moody's said last month South Africa's outlook was stable
and in January Standard and Poor's upgraded its view to stable. Such opinions and figures cast Africa's biggest economy in a
favourable light to, say, the United States, where a political
standoff over a looming government debt ceiling of 100 percent
of GDP is leading some to think the unthinkable -- that the
world's most trusted lender may renege on its obligations.
STABLE CURRENCY Even the threat of returns being eaten up by currency
weakness is a risk investors appear to be willing to take. The rand , one of the most heavily traded emerging
market currencies, has normally been very volatile but steady
dollar-buying from the central bank over the last year has
limited the worst of the gyrations, mostly keeping the unit
between 6.50 and 7.20 to the dollar. Not has the action limited the rand's gains, which now stand at around 13 percent against the dollar in the past 12 months. As such, an investor can keep a 5-year bond that yields 7.4
percent for six months without loosing too much sleep about a
devaluation. Pulling out is also comparatively easy thanks to the absence
of currency restrictions."It is a highly liquid market because South Africa does not
have exchange control restrictions," said Colen Garrow, an
economist at Brait, a private equity group. "We also don't have withholding tax when foreigners buy securities." At the peak of inflows into emerging markets last year,South Africa last year dismissed the idea of a tax on foreign
bond purchases -- such as one imposed by Brazil.

RATES LOW FOR LONGER Accommodative monetary policy has intensified the appeal of South African bonds, with the central bank's benchmark rate
likely to remain near 30-year lows into 2012 due to the bank's
reluctance to take action that might harm a fragile domestic
recovery. The benchmark rate fell by 650 basis points to 5.5 percent
between December 2008 and December 2010. "I expect this foreign buying to continue as weak growth
from abroad finds expression domestically. The market appears to
be pricing out expectations of a rate hike in 2011, pushing it
out to 2012," said George Glynos of economists ETM.
(Editing by Ed Cropley, Ron Askew)

Western Cape economy set to benefit from major oil find off Namibian coast

July 8 2011 at 08:59am

http://www.capetimes.co.za/polopoly_fs/ct-oil-rig-8606-1.1095551%21/image/1543300651.jpg_gen/derivatives/box_300/1543300651.jpg inlsa
An oil rige berthed in Cape Town Harbour. The discovery of huge reserves, estimated at 11 billion barrels, off the Namibian coast is set to bring new opportunities locally for engineering industries. Photo: Cindy Waxa

Staff Writer
A MAJOR oil find off the Namibian coast could substantially benefit the Western Cape economy before planned production in 2015.
Namibia’s Mines and Energy Minister, Isak Katali, announced the find, expected to yield 11 billion barrels of oil reserves.
Adrian Strydom, an executive with the SA Oil and Gas Alliance (Saoga) tasked with skills development and training, said:
“If it’s legitimate, it will have a huge impact on the Western Cape because of the service hub we’ve been able to establish (here).”
A recent study commissioned by Saoga indicated that the West African offshore oil and gas market would expand strongly between 2009 and 2013, with expected investment in the maintenance and repair operations in those five years to accumulate to more than $150 billion.
Although the Western Cape does not yet have the required skills, Strydom said the “lead time” of four years would give the industry time to expand the skills base, but funding was needed for this.
He said South Africa was favourably suited to benefit from the African oil and gas industry.
“Africa will become an important oil and gas source and that will benefit us,” said Strydom.
The president of the Cape Chamber of Commerce, Michael Bagraim, declared the discovery a “game-changer” that would benefit the nearest industrial ports in Cape Town and Saldanha.
“It will bring new opportunities for engineering industries servicing the oil rigs and production facilities. It will mean more jobs for the Western Cape and the growth of the Namibian economy, as the foreign investment pours in. (It) will also create trading opportunities.
“Perhaps even more significant
is that the discovery gives credence to the theory that the West African oil fields extend southwards into our waters. It also means further gas discoveries are likely and the potential for efficient gas-fired power stations in the Western Cape is enhanced,” Bagraim said.
Table Bay port manager Sanjay Goven said the port was stretched to capacity.
“There’s no doubt that when it comes to oil rigs and larger vessels, we don’t have enough quayside space.”
According to the provincial government, a single repair job on a vessel typically generated more than R200 million for the regional economy, employing around 2 000 people.
“We’ve been asking the industry to look at Saldanha because we’re completely hemmed in,” Goven said.
Expanding the port by building another quay would not make “business sense”.
“Saldanha has space, but no- one wants to go there because all the engineering companies and suppliers are based in Cape Town,” Goven said.

I think its a matter of time before they find oil of the West Coast, that would be a game changer surely . Can you imagine if we did not need to import oil? We could turn SA into a Canada/Australia within our lifetime :banana:

yah that will be awesome... thats a good point though....its sad how most of us might not even be here to see the day that our country actually turns into an australia/canada

PLEASE stop saying Canada and fucking Australia!!! We just want to be better at what we do, we want to be SOUTH AFRICA!!!

Fuck me, if we end up becoming australia, I don't want to be alive to see it - I understand that we want some elements of Canada/Uk/Oz as relates to structural and governmental stuff - but that is it.

^^I actually wanted to put that in the post but I resisted. But the synergies between sports and investment are amazing, no wonder the Brits and others want to monopolise these events. Anyways I'm always amazed at how there's always something happening in SA. The SA economy is going to amaze a lot of people over the coming decade and if you're not ready to get your slice of the pie because you're too busy moaning about ANC, BEE, Sky-is-falling, Zim 2.0, malema, zille etc then that's your fault. Let's get it!!

+ 1000

I think its a matter of time before they find oil of the West Coast, that would be a game changer surely .
I guess you read my facebook's comment on that Nostra...you just uttered my words...watch the space...Oil will be discovered soon...

From Ghana down to Namibia the western coast of Africa is fertile with Oil...I believe that we got stains of it in our west coast...

http://www.africancrisis.co.za/images/Political_Map_of_Africa.gif

PLEASE stop saying Canada and fucking Australia!!! We just want to be better at what we do, we want to be SOUTH AFRICA!!!

Fuck me, if we end up becoming australia, I don't want to be alive to see it - I understand that we want some elements of Canada/Uk/Oz as relates to structural and governmental stuff - but that is it.


Take it easy buddy ;) We will combine the best of all of them and mix it with our African flavour therefore we will be creating something that this world has never ever seen. All we have do to as Nostra said is to prepare ourselves now to reap the benefits tommorow...


Even if we loose SKA, we still got Shale Gas to explore ... damn this country is crazy...

Today, it feels good to be a south AFRICAn...

South Sudan isn't on the map :(

Um, the map is Copyright 2007 and Zaire is still there. South Sudan... well. Ja.

Not good

Urgent interventions needed to rebuild collapsing manufacturing confidence

By: Terence Creamer
15th July 2011

Manufacturing sector confidence deteriorated in the first quarter of 2011 despite a strong recovery in production, a survey of 18 CEOs representing South African enterprises with revenues of between R300-million and R10-billion shows. These business leaders also warned on Friday that, unless urgent interventions are made to arrest the long-term decline of the sector and the current fall off in confidence, deindustrialisation might accelerate to the point of no return.

In its second bulletin, the Manufacturing Circle also warns that, although the sector is likely to continue showing a positive contribution in the second quarter, the rate of expansion will slow as the sector faces increased competition from cheap imports and as the strong rand continues to undermine export competitiveness.

Confidence levels are, thus, likely to fall further as a result of the current deterioration in global and domestic economic conditions, while the recent protracted and violent strike in the metals and engineering milieu will hit output, costs and the sustainability of some export markets.

The nascent organisation currently comprises 26 of South Africa's leading manufacturing enterprises, including companies such as ArcelorMittal South Africa, Aspen, BMW, Consol, Actom, Hulamin and Bell. Economist and independent adviser Dr Iraj Abedian of Pan-African Research and Investment Services compiles its quarterly survey.

Chairperson and PG Group CEO Stewart Jennings says decisive action is required from government on a range of issues, from the overvaluation and volatility the rand to the dearth of key infrastructure, in order to rebuild confidence and to spur new investment.

In fact, Abedian cautions that in the absence of efforts to reverse what has been a multidecade decline, South Africa could reach a tipping point whereby the remaining industrial base could “dissipate” beyond repair. This would undermine the job-rich recovery being sought by government under the New Growth Path, given that it was more difficult to substitute labour for technology in the manufacturing environment than was the case in services.

“We have allowed our manufacturing sector to suffer for too long,” Abedian argues, adding that small and medium manufacturers were being devastated.

Support packages, along the lines being pursued in China, South Korea, India and Brazil, should be considered to create the conditions for surplus capacity to be used, as well as for new manufacturing investments and jobs to be generated.

The Manufacturing Circle welcomes the move by the National Treasury to integrate local content stipulations into government’s Preferential Procurement Regulations. But Actom’s Andries Tshabalala questioned the need for a six-month delay between the announcement of the regulations and eventual implementation of regulations on December 7, 2011, saying it “will cost jobs”.

Similarly Jennings and other executives have expressed dismay at the lack of implementation surrounding the NGP and the Industrial Policy Action Plan, both of which emphasise government’s aspiration to bolster manufacturing.

They are, thus, calling for leadership to ensure “cohesion” and implementations rather than a new round of debates.

“We’ve nurtured a culture in this country where everything gets turned into an academic debate. So while all our peer Brics [Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa] countries are absolutely driven, have little suspicion between the public and the private sectors, and are busy implementing, we continue to debate,” Aspen’s Stavros Nicolau laments, adding that these debates have become breeding grounds for a breakdown in cohesion.

http://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/urgent-interventions-needed-to-rebuild-collapsing-manufacturing-confidence-2011-07-15

Cameron: UK-SA to double bilateral trade
July 18 2011 at 04:03pm


Comment on this story


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The UK and South Africa are committed to doubling bilateral trade by 2015, visiting UK Prime Minister David Cameron said on Monday.

Addressing a news conference after talks with South African President Jacob Zuma at the Union Buildings in Pretoria, Cameron, on his first visit to sub-Saharan Africa since taking office in May 2010, noted that trade between the two countries was currently valued at around nine billion pounds.

He described the relationship between the two countries as “strong”, saying the two countries were dedicated to making it even stronger.

Cameron intimated that a large part of his role was to boost the British economy and establish trade links, which was the main purpose of this trip.

He noted that there were two sides to Africa - the starving as well as the booming parts - and that the UK wanted to play a key role in the continent's transformation. He said South Africa presented a “gateway to that economic future”.

Cameron said the UK wished to seize the opportunity of a booming Africa, adding that the UK would invest in key trade areas on the continent.

He mentioned that the UK had earmarked two million pounds to help alleviate suffering in the Horn of Africa, which situation he described as “catastrophic”.

President Zuma said the two leaders had discussed a huge range of issues, particularly trade matters. They also discussed Libya and Zimbabwe.

“All of us feel we need to resolve the Libyan question,” Zuma said, adding that he was very happy to hear in greater detail the European Union's view on the matter.

Zuma said he was also able to enlighten the UK leader on the progress being made with regard to Zimbabwe.

Cameron praised South Africa for its leadership in trying to resolve the Libyan crisis and urged all sides to try to avoid any further loss of life in the region.

He also believed that Libya should decide its own future.

The British Prime Minister also supported a democratic Zimbabwe with a roadmap to plot the way forward and “credible” elections.

In closing, Cameron said he was proud to be here in South Africa on the historic occasion of former president Nelson Mandela's 93rd birthday, saying Mandela was an inspiration to the world. - I-Net Bridge

David Cameron joins the new Scramble for Africa – catching up with ChinaPrime minister flies into South Africa on Nelson Mandela's 93rd birthday at start of curtailed tour


David Cameron flies into South Africa on Monday morning, the 93rd birthday of Nelson Mandela, pictured here celebrating last year. Photograph: Peter Morey/AP
Intense discussions were held in No 10 last week about whether David Cameron should abandon a two-day visit to South Africa and Nigeria which begins on Monday morning on Nelson Mandela's 93rd birthday.

There were fears that flying across the world at such a sensitive political moment could risk a John Major moment. The former prime minister is haunted by memories of overseas trips that were overwhelmed by events back home.

Eventually Cameron's team decided to go ahead with the trip when they clocked the advantages of being in a similar time zone to London. A convenient gap in his diary in Nigeria on Tuesday afternoon will mean that aides – and possibly the prime minister himself – will be able to follow the appearance of Rupert and James Murdoch on television.

But there was another factor that persuaded the prime minister to press ahead with the trip, although it has been shortened from four days to two. This is a new Scramble for Africa that is currently taking place across the continent.
Only last week the German chancellor Angela Merkel visited Kenya, Angola and Nigeria, accompanied by a delegation of German business leaders, with a message that she was promoting trade not aid. Cameron will follow a similar pattern. He is taking a 25-strong business delegation, which includes the Barclays chief executive Bob Diamond, and saying the purpose of his trip is to promote trade.

But this is not a rerun of the 19th century Scramble for Africa where the Great European powers, led by Britain and Germany, fought for the minerals and resources of Sub-Saharan Africa. This time the Europeans are playing catch up with the dominant force in Africa – China.

The raw economic statistics for South Africa, where Cameron will on Monday meet President Jacob Zuma, show China's dominance. Nearly a fifth (17.2%) of goods imported by South Africa came from China. Germany is in second place (11.2%) with the US in third place on 7.4%, according to figures from the CIA World Factbook which does not register the figures for Britain. China heads the lists of South African exports – 10.3%. Britain is fifth on 5.5% behind the US (9.2%), Japan (7.6%) and Germany on 7%.

And so the prime minister will follow the example of Merkel when he lands in South Africa on Monday morning with a planeload of 25 British business leaders. He will make clear that Britain is still deeply committed to providing aid to Sub-Saharan Africa. The presence of Andrew Mitchell, the international development secretary, will underline that point. Mitchell will fly into South Africa from northern Kenya where he has been leading Britain's response to the famine.

But the prime minister will say that the greatest way to lift Africa out of poverty, particularly a highly developed economy such as South Africa, is by promoting trade. Lord Green, the trade minister, is also on the trip.

The prime minister writes in South Africa's Business Day on Monday that an African free trade area could increase trade across the continent by $62bn a year – $20bn more than Sub-Saharan Africa receives in aid:

In the past, there were marches in the West to drop the debt. There were concerts to increase aid. And it was right that the world responded. But they have never once had a march or a concert to call for what will in the long term save far more lives and do far more good – an African free trade area. The key to Africa's progress is not just aid. It is time for some fresh thinking.

Cameron will have mixed emotions when he lands in South Africa on Nelson Mandela Day which is designed, in the words of the organisers, to "inspire individuals to take action to help change the world for the better". The future prime minister does not like to be reminded that he visited apartheid South Africa while Mandela was still in prison.

The prime minister atoned for the Tories' less than glorious record on apartheid in his first year as party leader when he said that Margaret Thatcher was wrong to have opposed sanctions on South Africa. Cameron broke with the Tories' record on apartheid in an Observer article in August 2006 after meeting Mandela, described by the future prime minister as "one of the greatest men alive".

On Monday Cameron will not visit Mandela who will be in the Eastern Cape for his birthday celebrations. If the prime minister had gone ahead with his original plan to visit Africa over four days, including trips to far poorer countries than South Africa and Nigeria, perhaps time might have been found for a Cape birthday greeting

Govt: Great prospects for SA in India
Jul 21 2011 07:36

Sapa

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Johannesbrg - South African companies are being urged to use the leverage of its government's strong political relationship with India to develop new business and investment opportunities.

Now a member of the Brics emerging economies grouping alongside Brazil, Russia, India and China, South Africa, is in a strong position, experts believe, to enhance its South-South co-operation.

Trade volumes between South Africa and India doubled from 2007 to 2010, with India becoming South Africa's sixth-largest destination for exports and its ninth-largest source for imports.

South Africa's minister of trade and industry, Rob Davies, said he believes there is huge potential for furthering mutually beneficial trade exchange and increasing investment channels between South Africa and India.

Speaking at the launch of the India Africa Business Network (IABN) at the University of Pretoria Gordon Institute of Business Science (Gibs), Davies, said world trade patterns were changing and that South Africa was in a good position to seize new opportunities.

"The African continent is now in a fortunate position where there is now a diversity of trade and investment partners," he told an audience of Indian and South African business leaders and bankers at the GIBS Sandton campus in Johannesburg.

"No longer are we confined in terms of trade and investment to the old powers that we used to know in the past," he said.

"We now have broader opportunities, particularly from Bric (Brazil, Russia, India and China) countries being here on the African continent, and India is of course among them."

He added: "There's a very solid commitment from the South African government and our institutions to support South African businesses in becoming more involved in India." The minister welcomed the IABN as a way to help grow business relations and address what he called a "mindset issue" relating to how South African companies could position themselves better among dynamic markets.

The IABN will be run out of Gibs' newly-formed Centre for Dynamic Markets (CDM) and will complement existing networks such as IBSA (India, Brazil and South Africa) and the India and South Africa CEOs forum co-chaired by leading Indian industrialist Ratan Tata and Patrice Motsepe, executive-chairperson of African Rainbow Minerals [JSE:ARM].

The new network's founder and director, Abdullah Verachia, described IABN as a "knowledge hub for India-Africa commerce" promoting exchange between business leaders and educational institutions in both countries.

He said: "We want to provide a forum where senior South African and Indian government and business leaders can meet and interact so as to increase trade and investment between the two economies.

"There are incredible opportunities for South African businesses in India, which has a population in excess of one billion. The two countries are also on the first tier of emerging market economies and both face similar challenges of poverty and inequality." He agreed with Davies that the political foundations that united the two countries through their anti- colonial struggles provided a strong platform for economic engagement.

"It is now how we leverage that counts," noted Verachia, who is also a director at the Johannesburg-based Frontier Advisory strategy and research company.

Indian investment in South Africa is estimated to be more than $6bn with several major Indian multinationals such as Tata, Reliance, and Mahindra and Mahindra having established a firm foothold in the local market place.

This week Tata is due to begin construction on a vehicle assembly plant in Rosslyn, outside Pretoria.

Although details are being kept firmly under wraps until the launch on July 22, the factory is believed to be the first of its kind in South Africa and will assemble pre-manufactured parts to produce light commercial vehicles, which are currently imported into the country.

India's High Commissioner in South Africa, Virender Gupta, told IPS: "Tata has been importing vehicles to South Africa for a long time and it was the logical step to start manufacturing here.

"It's a very significant development and I would really like more Indian companies to go that route, of creating manufacturing facilities and jobs here in Africa." South African investment in India is so far only at around the $250m mark, spearheaded by SABMiller [JSE:SAB], FirstRand [JSE:FSR] (the first African bank to get an operating license in Africa) and Airports Company South Africa, which won a lucrative contract to rehabilitate Mumbai Airport.

Verachia said the aim of the IABN was to help address that imbalance and help more small and medium South African businesses find their way into the Indian market.

"If you look at Indian investment coming to South Africa, it is in a second wave through smaller businesses, and we as South Africans need to look at that see how we can take advantage of similar opportunities in India," he explained.

Davies said that mutually beneficial trade was South Africa's key objective going forward and that greater engagement with emerging economies gave them an "historic opportunity to create new patterns of trading".

"The dialogue we are having at the moment is looking at the areas where we are directly competitive and those where we are complementary," he explained.

"The questions are, can we not identify the complementary areas and prioritise those and so contribute to both growth and employment in both of our countries?" Davies said South Africa currently exported primary or scrap products like coal and wood pulp, while India exported value-added items like petroleum oils, cars, pharmaceuticals and mobile phones.

"We need to find a balance between competitiveness and co-operation," he said, something he believed the Cape to Cairo Free Trade Area would help achieve, as it would create a larger single market of Africa nearer in size to other Bric economies.

SOUTH Africa must increase investment and savings if it wants to grow the economy and create jobs, according to a World Bank report released on Wednesday.

"Countries that have had growth rates of 6 percent or higher for a sustained period have also had investments and savings of about 25 percent," World Bank country director for South Africa Ruth Kagia told reporters in Johannesburg.

She said when people thought about inclusive growth, which was one of South Africa's targets in its new growth path, investment and savings were not the first things that came to mind.

But, if South Africa were to achieve its goal of annual economic growth of 6 percent to 7 percent, this would be one of the key pillars.

South Africa's gross national savings as a share of gross national income was relatively low at 16 percent, while the investment rate was a "modest" 19 percent.

"The commission on growth and development (2008) concluded that an investment rate of 25 percent is the minimum to ensure sustained long-term growth," according to the World Bank's report entitled "The South African Economic Update".

Increasing savings and investments alone would not lead to economic growth, said report co-author Sandeep Mahajan.

South Africa would also need to use more labour-intensive production methods and improve its pace of technological innovation.

The report finds that although South Africa is an attractive place for business, this has not translated into investment and subsequent growth.

http://www.sowetanlive.co.za/news/business/2011/07/21/sa-s-strategy-for-growth

SA's failing economy

Sunday Times Editorial: News that South Africa ranks 10th for foreign direct investment in Africa came as a shock to a nation that likes to think it is destined to be the continent's leading economy.

South Africa ranks below Nigeria and Egypt - two countries which are on the rise - but we are also, incredibly, behind Libya.

However, we should not be surprised by the world's dwindling interest in investing in this country.

We have, after all, spent the last decade doing everything we can to blunt our competitiveness and to discourage industrial investment.

Top of the list of disincentives to invest is our weak and uncertain policy environment.

The ruling party is quite happy to allow a "debate" on nationalisation, an economic policy model so laughable that even supposedly socialist nations such as China have long since jettisoned it.

It is not clear whether we intend maintaining our fiscal discipline, considering the growing calls for a "developmental state" which intervenes aggressively in every sector of the economy.

And our resources sector is foundering amid rising labour costs and a lack of skills - even as other resource-rich countries such as Brazil and Australia cash in on the global demand for metals and minerals.

When multinationals such as Walmart decide they are nonetheless willing to take the risk of investing, they find themselves treated to a Kafkaesque journey through a bureaucratic maze as the state takes itself to court over its own administrative decisions.

While we fiddle, our competitors are eating our lunch.

http://www.timeslive.co.za/opinion/editorials/2011/07/31/sa-s-failing-economy

Spot on.

SA's failing economy



http://www.timeslive.co.za/opinion/editorials/2011/07/31/sa-s-failing-economy

Talk about twisting stats to suit your agenda (editors). I actually have the UNCTAD FDI report right in front of me and it is apparent that the editor cherry-picked stats to buttress their agenda.

Firstly all the countries that are higher than SA are all oil producers (thus investment is very superficial), secondly SA does not need as much FDI to drive economic growth like other African countries (internaly raised capital is nearly sufficient), thirdly 2010 was an anomally, the Walmart deal alone surpasses last year's flows. FDI flows is such a arbitrary index of economic health IMO.

I'm sorry but that editorial is pure waffle by someone who does not know what they're talking about.

'Brain drain is slowing'
Article By: John Loos
Mon, 15 Aug 2011 11:32
EmailMore
Since the first quarter of 2008, when we began to ask agents surveyed in the FNB Estate Agent Survey to provide us with estimates as to the reasons that people sell homes, emigration selling has never been lower than in 2011, when expressed as a percentage of total residential selling.

From a peak of 20 percent in the third quarter of 2008, the percentage of residential sellers believed to be emigrating has declined to four percent for both the first and second quarters of 2011.

Could it be a relatively positive sentiment towards South Africa from its inhabitants?

It is difficult to say. A well-organised 2010 World Cup may have helped, but the ongoing crime problem may not help sentiment. Certainly a relative strong rand performance improves the affordability of emigration.

But, flows of investments and people between countries have to do with "relative sentiment or environment changes" between countries. So, while absolute confidence in SA’s future may or may not have changed noticeably, there has arguably been a significant drop in the confidence levels regarding many European countries, including the UK, due to serious systemic and economic troubles in recent years while the US’ economic fortunes have also deteriorated significantly.

Sentiment aside, high unemployment rates in many developed countries probably mean that they aren’t nearly as welcoming to immigrants from the likes of South Africa compared to a few years ago in the global boom years, and even where they are welcoming of immigrants the job prospects just aren’t as promising as a few years ago.

As a possible indicator of South African skills returning from abroad, we ask agents to estimate the percentage of expats buying property in South Africa. This is not perfect, as expats buying property in SA don’t always do so with a view to returning permanently. Nevertheless, we assume that this is a partial indicator of skills returning or intending to return.

The estimated percentage of expats buying property appears to have been relatively stable around two to three percent since mid-2009. This implies that the gap between emigration sellers, at four percent of selling, and expat buyers, at two percent of total buying, appears to have narrowed since 2009/10, suggesting that the net skilled labour outflow may have subsided in 2011.

A slower skills drain in tough economic times may well provide an opportunity for employers to boost their labour force skills levels. While our own economy is also showing signs of weakening along with the global economy, and the private sector may not have a short term need for what have possibly become more abundant skills in SA, for a non-cyclical sector such as government and its parastatals such tough economic times are arguably a good opportunity to bolster the quality of skills, and with it service and infrastructure delivery. In 2009 and 2010, indeed, the public sector was largely responsible for positive employment growth in the economy, according to SARB employment indices.

Sitting on a mountain of cash
LYNLEY DONNELLY

Aug 26 2011 00:00

Amid warnings of more global economic turmoil, South African corporate savings are at a multi-decade high, according to research by Stanlib.

The money corporate South Africa was sitting on at the end of 2010 was at its highest levels since 1995, reaching nearly 18% of gross domestic product, or roughly R479-billion. "Cash on hand has risen dramatically," said Kevin Lings, chief economist at Stanlib.

This appears to mirror similar cases seen internationally, such as that of technology giant Apple, which has more cash than the United States government. Last month Apple was widely reported as having more than $76-billion in cash reserves, more than the US treasury's $74-billion.

In the US companies currently have $2-trillion in cash on their balance sheets.

According to Lings, many businesses in South Africa cut costs in response to the global recession by cutting jobs, but many of those jobs have not been restored in spite of some modest economic growth. This has translated into good profit for many companies.

Other businesses chose to clean up their balance sheets, pay some dividends and then "literally put money into deposits", in spite of relatively low interest rates, said Lings. The pattern was being followed by large corporates rather than small companies. The latter were "decimated" by the recession as they ran out of cash and then were unable to access finance to weather the storm. There is, however, no single answer to why companies were not deploying this money, he said; there are many reasons across various sectors.

Notably, the reasons include complaints about the difficulty of securing electricity supply for new operations, as well as the policy uncertainty generated by the nationalisation debate, Lings said.

Limited rail infrastructure and port capacity at locations such as Durban harbour also make businesses reluctant to expand.

Growing uncertainty
Changes to labour policy and legislation, as well as concerns about skills, continue to be bugbears for business. These problems exist in the context of growing global economic uncertainty and fear of further recession.

"Businesses are becoming short-term in focus, focusing on cost management, including labour," he said.

A tipping point or catalyst that would spur companies to spend their cash in South Africa would be investment "unashamedly geared towards business rather than consumers".

The Stanlib information comes on the heels of growing debate about whether economic growth and job creation should be state led or left in the hands of the private sector.

With the launch of government policies such as the new growth path and the related industrial policy action plan (Ipap2) the private sector has warned that increased state intervention in the economy may hamper development and deter investors.

Michael Spicer, the outgoing chief executive of Business Leadership South Africa, argued that it was simplistic to say that corporate South Africa is simply "sitting on a pot of money and not using it".

"The broader debate keeps going back to structural issues, including the cost and supply of electricity and infrastructure bottlenecks. Those things are not being addressed," he said.

Those issues, along with very hostile external global conditions, mean companies and entrepreneurs are simply seeing little or no opportunity to provide sustainable services to the market and get a fair return on their investment, Spicer said. Job creation and employment are an outcome of this process, he said, rather than the sole purpose for businesses to grow or expand.

Mark Swilling, professor of sustainable development at Stellenbosch University's School of Public Leadership, argued that the hoarding of cash preceded current policy debates and is deeply rooted in the global financial and economic crisis.

He said the past 25 years had resulted in an addiction to easy profits derived from investment in paper and an aversion to higher-risk, messy investment in the complexities of real production.

'The real economy'
"The collapse of Lehman Brothers in October 2008 was the most decisive moment in the collapse of a system that made it possible to make quick and high profits by investing in paper rather than in the 'real economy'," said Swilling.

He referred to the arguments of former British prime minister Gordon Brown and former World Bank chief economist Joseph Stiglitz that finance capital needs to "be disciplined so that investments in the real economy can once again be seen as profitable".

"This means making a transition from the a global-casino economy driven by the pursuit of capital gains to a global economy driven by patient capital that is satisfied with dividends earned from long-term investments in the real economy," Swilling said.

Although corporates support growth and job creation there is very little evidence that they have an appetite for risk and long-term returns, he said.

There is also little evidence that major investors are looking at investments that could break the stranglehold of the mineral-energy complex.

Swilling said that since 1994 the non-financial sectors that have experienced growth are related to mining and energy production, while non-financial, non-mineral and energy sectors have stagnated or declined.

"But these are exactly the sectors that are less capital intensive, create more jobs, are more dependent on innovation and better suited to patient capital looking for returns from dividends."

To enable this, South Africa needs an "investment Codesa", Swilling said. It needs to be supported by structured processes of engagement that put creativity and innovation at the centre of a new generation of industrial-strategy units that include universities, business, labour and government.


http://mg.co.za/article/2011-08-26-sitting-on-a-mountain-of-cash/

SA to grow by 4 percent
Fri, 26 Aug 2011 7:46

South African growth prospects should rise to four percent a year in 2011 and 2012, underpinned by solid domestic demand, an International Monetary Fund (IMF) staff report on SA released on Thursday said.

The main downside risks to the outlook were external, according to the IMF.

The document noted that local authorities faced the dual challenge of sustaining the ongoing recovery while rebuilding the policy space, and raising potential growth and labour intensity of growth to help reduce "extremely" high levels of unemployment and inequality.

The import intensity of investment and, more broadly, growth, would likely cause the current account deficit to increase to 3.5 percent of GDP in 2011 and gradually further widen to about five percent to six percent percent over the medium term, the IMF forecast.

The IMF said following discussions with local authorities, there was broad agreement that barring a pronounced increase in core inflation or inflation expectations policy rate increases could be put off given the still uneven nature of the recovery and uncertain global environment.

Policies to moderate real wage growth and increase product market competition would be critical to reverse the large job losses of recent years and make inroads into reducing high structural unemployment, the IMF said.

The main risks to financial stability in SA remained banks' dependence on domestic short-term wholesale deposits and high household indebtedness, the fund noted.

The IMF said that relatively low public and external debts, mainly denominated in domestic currency, and adequate international reserve coverage offset risks from currency overvaluation and current account deficits funded by portfolio flows.

Good news although I very much doubt we will come in at 4% this year. It will be closer to 3% ( given the fact that the latest figures on domestic demand are very weak and exports are going to take a hit given problems in the wider world economy). Still 3% would be quite a good effort given what is going on in the rest of the world.

Good news although I very much doubt we will come in at 4% this year. It will be closer to 3% ( given the fact that the latest figures on domestic demand are very weak and exports are going to take a hit given problems in the wider world economy). Still 3% would be quite a good effort given what is going on in the rest of the world.


Huh? Not being argumentative which figures are you using as a proxy for domestic demand? Retail figures or credit extension? Because as far as I was aware, domestic demand is quite robust given the high wage settlements and relatively benign inflation. But I do think the IMF is being overly optimistic...

In a report outlining the long-term growth outlook for the EEMEA countries - Europe, Middle East and Africa - Bank of America Merrill Lynch says in its view South Africa, Turkey and Saudi Arabia are the markets with the most promising ten-year growth outlook.

“Based on an analysis of growth determinants from demographics to leverage, we conclude that this decade Turkey, S. Africa and Saudi Arabia will improve their growth performance. We see the highest average level of growth in Turkey (4.8%) and S. Africa (4.2%), with most of the rest of the region clustered between 3-4%,” the bank says.

Under a heading 'South Africa: not spent yet', the bank forecasts that stronger-than-expected consumer spending and a stimulus from government investment on infrastructure is likely to boost growth to 5% between 2013 and 2016.

Without structural reform, economic growth is likely to fall back to a 4% trend pace, insufficient to meaningfully reduce very elevated unemployment, it predicts.

“We see sound reasons for a stronger than expected consumer story even though South Africa's growth may look somewhat pedestrian compared with BRIC economies like China and India. We think the thrust of government policy - on jobs, infrastructure and service delivery - will provide the backdrop for positive consumer growth that is less driven by the middle class and more by lower income households migrating up the income ladder. Government infrastructural spending will also be a key boost to growth over the next several years.

“We estimate that the combination of upward surprises to consumer spending and public infrastructural spending should help boost growth to a 5% pace between 2013 and 2016,” the bank states.

But it notes that structural reform is key to boosting growth in Africa's richest state.

“Without efforts to address key headwinds to growth, for instance by alleviating the skills gap in the short-medium term via skilled immigration, revitalising the educational system, and through labour and product market reform, we think South Africa is likely to moderate back to a 4% pace of growth until 2020.

“If tough decisions are taken over the next few years, South Africa's growth potential could accelerate beyond 2016 to 6%, in our view. The introduction of the national health system (NHI), while likely to be phased over a 15-year period, has the potential to be a significant headwind to growth via a growing fiscal and tax burden.

The Bank of America Merill Lynch report also points out that a number of structural issues hamper South Africa's ability to maximise economic growth and employment, in its view. Three key constraints, it notes, are a skills mismatch, inflexible labour markets and onerous product market regulation.

On the skills issue, it says that the demand for unskilled labour has been declining over the past two decades as traditional labour intensive industries such as mining, agriculture and manufacturing have been in secular decline as the economy has orientated towards a more skills and services based footing.

“However, educational standards are very poor. Only 35% of South Africans over the age of 20 have a secondary school pass according to the SA Institute of Race Relations and there are only 26 PhD graduates per million of the population compared with 264 in Australia and 187 in South Korea.”

The report further notes that the World Economic Forum (WEF) Global Competitiveness Index shows South Africa's ranking falling from 45 in 2008/09 to 54 in 2010/11, out of 139 countries. On labour market flexibility, South Africa slipped from 88th in 2008/09 to 97 in 2010/11.

“The underlying components show inflexible hiring and firing practices (135th), a lack of flexibility in wage determination by companies (131st), and poor labour-employer relations (132nd). These labour related weaknesses correspond to institutional strengths such as the accountability of private institutions (3rd), intellectual property protection (27th), property rights (29th), goods market efficiency (40th); financial market development (9th), business sophistication (38th); innovation (44th) and good scientific research institutions (29th).”

On onerous product market regulation, the bank notes that the OECD's product market regulation (PMR) scores highlight that South Africa has more restrictive regulation than OECD economies and other EM economies like Brazil. This is particularly in the areas of barriers to entrepreneurship and barriers to trade and investment.

“The OECD notes that SA firms complain of regulatory compliance complexity and complicated procedures for getting licences,” the bank adds. - I-Net Bridge


http://www.iol.co.za/business/business-news/sa-turkey-saudi-most-promising-1.1129680

Ramos: Nationalisation won't work


Cape Town - Absa Group [ASA] CEO Maria Ramos said on Friday that the nationalisation of mines would not be in the country's interests.

Addressing students at the University of Cape Town, Ramos said: "I don't think nationalising our mines is going to solve the problems of this country, but that is just my view," she said.

Ramos said that while she was not the best person to speak about mining, it did seem to be a heavily capital intensive exercise.

She said it was not just the nationalisation of mines that was the issue, but also the best use of state resources.

"I think that we need to keep this (debate) in perspective. South Africa already has a lot of state-owned enterprises. As a country we already own a big chunk of things. I ran a state-owned enterprise (Transnet) that ran railways, harbours and airlines and owned lots and lots of land.

"I think we sometimes think that the only way that you can create wealth and opportunity is if the state owns it," Ramos said.

She said that she did not know if that was the right answer, and questioned whether the state should be using its resources to pay out existing shareholders for the value they would otherwise lose when they sold their mines.

"The state would have to use a significant amount of capital," Ramos said.

She said the state should probably best be using its resources to invest in health and education.

"I happen to think that wealth is not what lies under the ground. In my mind the wealth in our country is you (the students) and the best thing we could do is invest in education and the human capital and for (students) to go out there and do great things," she said.


like build railways to deliver mined goods to the markets....if only Maria..:bash:

Aussies are not going to like this, but their pride and joy, Fosters, is about to be taken over by SABMillers. Although SAB paid more than $1bn in tax to the SA govt last year, this was in relation to local sales; thus, new Oz acquisition won't have any impact on the SA economy through repatriation tax as SABMiller is now headquartered in London, and it uses a bunch of dubious loopholes to dodge paying taxes in Africa, incl SA.

-----------------

SABMiller, From Local Brewer to Global Leader

By DEALBOOK

SABMiller’s $10 billion hostile bid for the Foster’s Group may be the brewer’s largest. But it is only the latest in a history of global deal-making at the company.

Its acquisitive spirit dates back to the end of apartheid in South Africa in 1994. With the borders open and a democratic government in place, the company, then a sprawling conglomerate of beer, soda bottling, furniture, apparel and other businesses, refocused on beverages — and management set its sights on the world.

Executives studied the global practices of multinational corporations like Unilever and IBM, applying what they learned to their own operations. They also aimed at strategic purchases in Africa and elsewhere.

“Coming from South Africa, we probably had a natural curiosity, almost an inferiority complex that we were from a developing country, and therefore there must be something better out there,” Norman Adami, the current chairman of SAB Limited, SABMiller’s South African operations, once told BusinessWeek.

Among its first moves, SAB sought expansion into Eastern Europe. In 1995, the beer maker bought a majority of the LECH Brewery in Poznan, Poland. It picked up the Vultural, Ursus and Pitber breweries the following year, expanding its reach into Romania. SAB soon added brands in Slovakia, Russia and the Czech Republic, including Pilsner Urquell and Radegast. By 2001, SAB’s international operations accounted for more than 40 percent of sales.

SAB would cement its transition from big local brewer to global giant in 2002 with the purchase of Miller Brewing Company in the United States. It was a transformative deal, creating the No. 2 brewer in the world by volume.

The newly renamed SABMiller quickly added brands in fast-growing developing markets and more mature, cash-rich regions. It acquired a big stake in the Italian maker of Peroni, continued to plow resources into its joint venture China Resources Snow Breweries and made a deal for Bavaria, South America’s second-largest brewer.

Amid industry consolidation, SABMiller now ranks as one of the world’s leading brewers. The company recently notched annual revenue of nearly $30 billion.

That puts SABMiller just behind the industry leader Anheuser-Busch InBev and a long way from its scrappy deal-making start.


http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/08/17/sabmiller-from-local-brewer-to-global-leader/

The latest developments on the takeover...

SABMiller to take over Foster's for $10-billion

LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM - Sep 21 2011 16:03

Australian beer giant Foster's has accepted an improved takeover offer worth Aus$9.9-billion from British-based brewer SABMiller, the pair announced on Wednesday.

Foster's Group, whose leading lager brands include Corona and Foster's, had in August rejected a hostile bid of Aus$9.51-billion from SABMiller, which produces rival beers Grolsch and Miller Lite.

But Foster's on Wednesday said its board had accepted an improved offer of Aus$5.10 per Foster's share, while the deal will also see Foster's return some cash to its shareholders. SABMiller shares rose slightly in London on the news.

SABMiller said it expects the takeover to be completed before the end of 2011 after approval by Foster's shareholders.

"We are pleased that we have reached agreement on a recommended transaction to be put to Foster's shareholders," SABMiller chief executive Graham Mackay said.

"We look forward to working with Foster's employees and other stakeholders to ensure the success of Foster's in the future as the largest brewer in Australia with an outstanding portfolio of brands," Mackay added.

The prospect of a takeover of Foster's had been anticipated since a recent demerger and amid consolidation within the Australian beverage industry.

"The board believes SABMiller's revised proposal ... reflects compelling value for Foster's shareholders and delivers certain cash proceeds in an uncertain global economic environment and high equity market volatility," Foster's chairperson David Crawford said.

Foster's, which owns Australia's largest brewer Carlton and United Breweries, recently split its beer division from the underperforming wine assets, which had suffered because of a grape glut and soaring local dollar.

SABMiller's pursuit of the Australian company is meanwhile in line with its own strategy of extending its global reach. Founded in South Africa in 1895, SABMiller operates in 75 countries, while it is also a major bottler of Coca-Cola.

The maker of Castle lager, SABMiller has noted that Australia has a strong, wealthy and growing economy that is well positioned to benefit from continued economic growth in Asia, and has a profitable beer market.

Foster's has meanwhile been battling intense competition in the beer industry, affecting its flagship brands VB, Crown and Carlton Draught. Foster's estimated that the domestic beer market shrank 7% in the second half of 2010.

But SABMiller, whose products also include Peroni Nastro Azzurro, Tyskie and Blue Moon, said in May that annual net profits for 2010-11 had jumped by a quarter to US$2.4 billion on rising sales in developing markets.

African, Asian and Latin American sales rose 20%, 16% and 7% respectively. SABMiller added that its North America sales were flat, while in Europe they fell 3%.

The world's biggest brewer is Belgium's Anheuser-Busch InBev -- which makes beers including Beck's, Budweiser, Hoegarden, Leffe and Stella Artois. -- AFP


http://mg.co.za/article/2011-09-21-sabmiller-to-take-over-fosters-for-10billion

Well, the deal is done and I love the wringing of hands down under that another of their 'icons' has been sold off - South Africa owns your ASS, suckers!

It's always fun taking a little jab at the Aussies :lol:

Especially when you're jealous.

Especially when jealousy is a part of it.

Jealous of? :lol:

Fosters is the worst lager I’ve ever had the displeasure of drinking.

year:ranking (score) (rank change)

2010:113 (0.615) (steady)

2011:123 (0.619) (down 10)

Sources: http://hdr.undp.org/en/statistics/ and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Human_Development_Index

:)

We were just joking, relax.
Its just interesting how the developing world is catching up so fast, India China Brazil owning or buying or investing in everything, South Africa having the biggest brewer in the world and growing.
Wonder if SABmiller will rename Fosters to something more South African - I think Bokbeer would go down well in oz!

And Vcollaborater, what is with your post exactly?

Wonder if SABmiller will rename Fosters to something more South African - I think Bokbeer would go down well in oz!
They should rename it to Kakbier.

And Vcollaborater, what is with your post exactly?

The new UNHDR was released on that day, so I figured that I would post it.

I didn’t even see that you were talking about the SAB Miller thing and couldn't care less, now that I know, because I will never touch alcohol.:)

I once told myself I would never touch alcohol. Then, one rowdy night, alcohol touched me and thus began an amazing friendship.

^^

Hopefully temptation won't take me over.:lol:

I know about many people who is fu**ed because of alcohol, so this is basically my reason. :)

I know many people who are fun, amazing, creative and successful who are big drinkers. But I just drink because I love it - and to taste a beautiful red wine is a gift on this earth.
And off course a few vodkas.

^^

When I was 3 years old, somebody who was drunk puked on me while I was sleeping on some of the seats at Loftus during a Rugby game. :ohno:

The police arrested the guy after that. I feel sorry for him in some way.

I also know of many alcoholics, so I don't personally see anything good about alcohol ( The Cons cancel out the Pros for me). In some cases it seems like a short term solution for emotional problems. It is much better to find long term solutions for problems. :)

It is just a personal choice of mine and I still have friends etc who plans to ( or does) drink.

You're still a child.

I've known many holier than thou adolescents who go "I will never touch alcohol, its ev0l"... then they grow up and become big drinkers.... its actually the exception rather than the rule (from my experience) that children who say they won't drink actually stick to it.

Just like that "virginity pledge". Not until marriage. Sure, ok.

^^

I'm atheist, so meh. :lol:

Most people probably fall for it because of people like you. Luckily I am stubborn in that way. :nuts:


I am also going to add to this that most Muslims who make up around a sixth of the world's population achieve it, so it is possible.

I will once again add that you guys don't know me so go figure.

Here is the video that I have posted before. I understand it I hope you guys do.

mXvmSaE0JXA&feature=relmfu

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXvmSaE0JXA&feature=relmfu

I will ad this song as well

YnwfTHpnGLY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnwfTHpnGLY

Adam did your mouse slip?

Not even popcorn would make what's coming interesting... I'm using the ignore fxn for the second time ever. Decided to see if Project Director has anything good to say these days.

^^

When I was 3 years old, somebody who was drunk puked on me while I was sleeping on some of the seats at Loftus during a Rugby game. :ohno:

The police arrested the guy after that. I feel sorry for him in some way.

I also know of many alcoholics, so I don't personally see anything good about alcohol ( The Cons cancel out the Pros for me). In some cases it seems like a short term solution for emotional problems. It is much better to find long term solutions for problems. :)

It is just a personal choice of mine and I still have friends etc who plans to ( or does) drink.

You sound like a fun day out!
All these high minded ideals and morals, and an atheist too!

I predict a future of heavy drinking while you try and figure out what you really are - you know, the long term solutions for emotional yadayadayada!

Relax dude, you seem to take yourself very seriously, and life has a way of knocking that right out of you...

http://www.fin24.com/images/newheader/fin24_logo_transparent.gif

Redefine slams weak local councils
Nov 06 2011 11:58
Elma Kloppers

Johannesburg – One of South Africa’s largest listed property groups has decided to stop investing in areas where local authorities do not function properly.

Redefine’s decision to adopt a firm stance against questionable and poor management by local authorities could have far-reaching financial implications for such malfunctioning municipalities.

Not only has Redefine Income Fund [JSE:RDF] decided to stop investing in areas being poorly managed, but it has also decided to no longer make acquisitions in such areas or effect improvements to properties it already owns in such areas.

For local authorities this could ultimately mean the loss of millions of rand in municipal taxes and service fees.

In an interview with Sake24 last week Redefine chief executive Marc Wainer said that poor service delivery had got completely out of hand and he was sick and tired of being a cash cow for local authorities. He expects no favours from the authorities – only fair treatment.

He said against the background of a combination of poor infrastructure and a lack of service delivery in those areas property values will decline over time.

“We don't have many options with regard to the properties that we already own in such areas, but we can pick and choose in terms of new investments.”

He identified the Kopanong Municipality in Hammanskraal as one of the culprits.

Over the past year Redefine developed a Shoprite alongside the existing Kopanong shopping centre, at a cost of R36m. The store is due to open on November 15.

The project was delayed unnecessarily by sundry demands by the authorities and at one stage Redefine was expected to pay bribes to certain individuals. The company refused and it was then threatened with destruction of the building, said Wainer.

That is why Redefine will no longer undertake any development there. The plan had been to spend a total R110m to R120m on establishing another 22 to 26 additional shops.

Wainer said the Western Cape had the only local authorities in the country whose doors were “open for business”.

Redefine would like to invest more in that province, but the smaller economy offers limited opportunities.

The company also has the option of further investing offshore through its foreign subsidiary, Redefine International.

Professor Francois Viruly, a lecturer in property studies at the University of Cape Town’s school for Construction, Economics and Management, agrees that if conditions in South Africa become more oppressive many property developers could look beyond the country's borders for future business.

He said it was a pity that the smaller municipalities did not actively strive to attract investment so as augment their tax and service-fee base, but instead did the opposite.

The extent to which property companies are being “milked” by local authorities can be seen in their financial results.

Redefine, which last week announced its results for the year to end-August, said its property tax and electricity costs had increased by an astronomical 40% in the financial year.

These increases were sending the operating costs of commercial property companies sky-high and putting their net revenue margins under pressure.

Norbert Sasse, chief executive of Growthpoint, said not only were property tax, service fees and electricity costs rising faster than rentals, but companies were getting less and less service from the authorities.

“The lack of service delivery results in property owners having to pay out of their own pockets to compensate.”

According to a recent report by the Investment Property Databank commissioned by the South African Property Owners Association, electricity costs in the commercial property sector in the first six months of this year climbed to 29% of total operating costs for the sector, and property tax and service fees to 21%.

^^ seriously sad stuff. I wonder how long it will before Joburg goes this way (if it hasn't already)

The whole of Joburg?

I thought there were quite a few areas of Joburg doing very well...

Whilst it is just unacceptable that we have these dysfunctional local councils and the rest spoiling the party, I thought this was rather good news - it should highlight the really crap municipalities and bring more pressure to bear on them.



Redefine to focus on hotspot locations
04 Nov 2011



Johannesburg Stock Exchange listed property company, Redefine Properties, posted a distribution of 68 cents per linked unit for the year to August.

Redefine, the second-largest listed property loan stock company by market capitalisation announced its total distribution of 68 cents per linked unit for the year to August 31.

The company declared a distribution of 37 cents per linked unit for the six months ended August 31 and total distributable income for the year of R1.8 billion.

Headline earnings per linked unit declined to 71.22 cents for the year to August 31 from 98.11 cents the year before.

Redefine said that it had a range of diverse property assets under management exceeding R37 billion.

Geographically, South Africa generated 93 percent of distributable income.

Contractual rental income comprised 79 percent of total revenue, income from listed securities 10 percent, hotel income 5 percent and trading and fee income 6 percent.

Operating costs represented 26.5 percent (2010: 21.5 percent) of contractual rental income with roughly a quarter of this increase arising from higher local municipal and electricity charges that were not fully recoverable from tenants.

It also included non-recurring costs from internalising property management, which Redefine believed would enhance its tenant offering and improve efficiencies and economies.

Marc Wainer, chief executive officer of Redefine said that the group had made significant progress in implementing its strategy of restructuring and improving the quality of its core property portfolio.

Wainer said Redefine would concentrate the bulk of its portfolio in the Western Cape, KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng.

Within these areas, most of the portfolio would be located in so-called hotspots for offices and industrial premises.

"We are still happy to have retail shopping centres of sufficient size countrywide.

“However, we believe it is in these hotspots that the greatest rental growth and capital appreciation will evolve over the next few years."

Redefine had also decided not to invest further in areas where experience had shown that local authorities were dysfunctional.

While investing in these areas may well give us attractive initial yields, we have to ensure we obtain the required internal rate of return over a given period, he said.

The prognosis for property in many of these areas, in our view, is that values will in fact decline or growth will be very low.

Redefine said that based on the property portfolio restructuring strategy, the number of South African properties would decline from 358 to around 260 and the average property value would increase from R50 million to R80 million.

The total portfolio value would increase to some R20 billion.

We are convinced we are making the right decisions at the right time with the medium- and long-term benefits of all of our stakeholders in mind.

Hopefully this will be reflected in our distribution growth and the increase in net asset value over time, added Wainer. I-Net Bridge

^^ seriously sad stuff. I wonder how long it will before Joburg goes this way (if it hasn't already)

I don't think Johannesburg is included in this. Although there is room for improvement in that metro council, I think in the greater scheme of local municipalities, it is one of the better ones. I doubt Redefine was talking about Johannesburg, eThekwini and the larger metro councils. However, think a place like Nelson Mandela Bay could be in that "bad local council" grouping, unless things have drastically changed since local government elections.

Thing is, I travel around the country a lot, and the gulf between Western Cape towns and northern smaller cities/towns is widening at a sickening pace. You look at towns like Robertson, Montagu, George, Bredasdorp, Knysna Hermanus, Ceres, Tulbagh, Porterville, Vredenburg, Paarl, Franschhoek, Wellington etc., then you look at northern towns... the difference is becoming wider and wider. Even Worcester, which I often moan about, is like pseudo-paradise and looks well-kept compared to many a northern rural centre.

I go north and am shocked and saddened by Klerksdorp, Parys, Carletonville, Cathcart, Fort Beaufort, Standerton, Queenstown... jeez, too many! The only smaller cities/towns I can say looks as if they're looked after, are Potchefstroom and Grahamstown.

This is not only a warning to the municipalities, but to the voters as well. When one major investor withdraws, it usually catalyzes others to do the same: capital follows capital.

That's very subjective, I can also point out the sheer poverty/inequality/murder rate of the W.Cape in general (backed up by numbers) and show that it's no paradise.

Ever been to Polokwane, Rustenburg, Nelspruit, Lephalale, Burgersfort?? All are northern towns and cities and they growing at a faster rate than most of the cities you mentioned, and there are no obligatory shacks on their peripheries ...

^^

When I was 3 years old, somebody who was drunk puked on me while I was sleeping on some of the seats at Loftus during a Rugby game. :ohno:

.

serves you right for supporting the bulls

That's very subjective, I can also point out the sheer poverty/inequality/murder rate of the W.Cape in general (backed up by numbers) and show that it's no paradise.

Ever been to Polokwane, Rustenburg, Nelspruit, Lephalale, Burgersfort?? All are northern towns and cities and they growing at a faster rate than most of the cities you mentioned, and there are no obligatory shacks on their peripheries ...

Been to Rustenburg and Nelspruit (Mbombela), not the other three. Yes, Rustenburg is growing very very fast, but the urban management is not on the same level. Regardless of how differently you try to skin the same cat, this major property group has said they will not invest in poorly functioning municipalities, period. You defend the north on the bases of Cape inequality, poverty and crime rate (yes, Cape township crime to TOO high) and all you read from my commentary is "paradise." Fact is, developers are clearly using the criterion of urban management and service delivery and not those factors (some factually incorrect); thus investment-wise, they deem it a "paradise" in caparison. They pointed that out clearly, not me, but the top-brass at Redefine.

*PS. Cape Town's Gini Coefficient is lower than Johannesburg's and our poverty rate is MUCH MUCH lower than the national average!

Municipal Poverty Rate Map:
http://www.sarpn.org/documents/d0000990/images/poorest_municipalities.gif

Table of Poverty Rates: *Human Sciences Research Council*

Province........No. of poor persons (million).....% of population in poverty.....Poverty gap (R billion)......Share of poverty gap
Eastern Cape...............................4.6.................................72%..............................14.8.......................18.2%
Free State...................................1.8................................68%................................5.9........................7.2%
Gauteng......................................3.7.................................42%..............................12.1 ......................14.9%
KwaZulu-Natal..............................5.7.................................61%..............................18.3......................22.5%
Limpopo.......................................4.1................................77%...............................11.5......................14.1%
Mpumalanga.................................1.8.................................57%................................7.1........................8.7%
North West..................................1.9.................................52%................................6.1........................7.5%
Northern Cape..............................0.5.................................61%................................1.5........................1.8%
Western Cape..............................1.4..................................32%...............................4.1 .........................5.0%
South Africa...............................25.7.................................57%..............................81.3......................100.0%

Now, let's put that one argument to rest forever. One can make excuses till the cows come home, chickens come to roost or any other metaphor, investor perception is everything. If property conglomerates stop all investment, improvements and upgrades, local councils will suffer.

That's the problem with South Africa, we constantly make excuses for substandard quality. We're supposed to be World Class Africa, not just "Africa status quo."

Quote:
Originally Posted by VCollaborator


When I was 3 years old, somebody who was drunk puked on me while I was sleeping on some of the seats at Loftus during a Rugby game.


serves you right for supporting the bulls

Sob...once my g-g-girlfriend ate some fish she didn't like, and she puked on my shoes.
So I will NEVER eat fish - it is no long term solution for my emotional problems...:lol:

serves you right for supporting the bulls

I didn't support anyone back then. I was too young to care about Rugby. If I was to support someone though, it would have been the Stormers. My family is big Stormers fans. :lol: I dislike Rugby though...

Quote:

Sob...once my g-g-girlfriend ate some fish she didn't like, and she puked on my shoes.
So I will NEVER eat fish - it is no long term solution for my emotional problems...:lol:

Why would someone eat something that they dislike? – Unless it is a life threatening situation.

I made my decision to avoid alcohol based on many factors - the least of them being the puking incident.

The only difference between your girlfriend-analogy and what I believe is that there are other forms of refreshment like soda or fruit juice that are not harmful to the body whereas beer or wine contains alcohol which is.

^^ Guys... PLEASE! A little off topic. Welcome to chat, but could we please do that in the shebeen? :)

^^ Guys... PLEASE! A little off topic. Welcome to chat, but could we please do that in the shebeen? :)

Sorry :colgate:

It really would be the perfect topic for the Shebeen...being what it is and all ;)

=annman;85458360]Been to Rustenburg and Nelspruit (Mbombela), not the other three. Yes, Rustenburg is growing very very fast, but the urban management is not on the same level. Regardless of how differently you try to skin the same cat, this major property group has said they will not invest in poorly functioning municipalities, period. You defend the north on the bases of Cape inequality, poverty and crime rate (yes, Cape township crime to TOO high) and all you read from my commentary is "paradise." Fact is, developers are clearly using the criterion of urban management and service delivery and not those factors (some factually incorrect); thus investment-wise, they deem it a "paradise" in caparison. They pointed that out clearly, not me, but the top-brass at Redefine.
*PS. Cape Town's Gini Coefficient is lower than Johannesburg's and our poverty rate is MUCH MUCH lower than the national average!

Municipal Poverty Rate Map:
http://www.sarpn.org/documents/d0000990/images/poorest_municipalities.gif

Table of Poverty Rates: *Human Sciences Research Council*

Province........No. of poor persons (million).....% of population in poverty.....Poverty gap (R billion)......Share of poverty gap
Eastern Cape...............................4.6.................................72%..............................14.8.......................18.2%
Free State...................................1.8................................68%................................5.9........................7.2%
Gauteng......................................3.7.................................42%..............................12.1 ......................14.9%
KwaZulu-Natal..............................5.7.................................61%..............................18.3......................22.5%
Limpopo.......................................4.1................................77%...............................11.5......................14.1%
Mpumalanga.................................1.8.................................57%................................7.1........................8.7%
North West..................................1.9.................................52%................................6.1........................7.5%
Northern Cape..............................0.5.................................61%................................1.5........................1.8%
Western Cape..............................1.4..................................32%...............................4.1 .........................5.0%
South Africa...............................25.7.................................57%..............................81.3......................100.0%

Now, let's put that one argument to rest forever. One can make excuses till the cows come home, chickens come to roost or any other metaphor, investor perception is everything. If property conglomerates stop all investment, improvements and upgrades, local councils will suffer.

That's the problem with South Africa, [B]we constantly make excuses for substandard quality. We're supposed to be World Class Africa, not just "Africa status quo."

You have tha typical W.Cape smugness about you. Anyway the proof is in the pudding, let's see W.Cape outperforming economically, then we'll talk. If as you say its a 'investor's paradise, surely investor capital will inexorably flow towards it and dry up in other places right? Well let's see then...

I never said there would be a wholesale draining of investment and economic growth in the north, I even (in my original post) singled out Joburg as a high-performing municipal unit. Please don't put words in my mouth and discredit my rebuttal by labeling the presentation of facts as being "smug."

You're facts are legit, I checked them out, but you just have that smug "W.Cape uber-alles" tone. Honestly that's the only thing that riled me about your post....

You're facts are legit, I checked them out, but you just have that smug "W.Cape uber-alles" tone. Honestly that's the only thing that riled me about your post....

Western Capers deserve the attitude and the tone. That province is on another level. I'm embarrassed by what I see in Joburg.

This is relevant to the economy, so I will post here...great news and certainly a step forward, and not before time.
Loving the comment from the IFP youth league in bold below!


A good day for democracy in SA
Thursday, 10 November 2011

Julius Malema has been suspended from the ANC Youth League and told he has to vacate his position as president of the organisation.

The ANC's disciplinary committee found him guilty of provoking serious divisions in the ANC and bringing the organisation into disrepute, committee chairman Derek Hanekom told reporters in Johannesburg on Thursday.

The charges related to him deliberately disrupting a meeting of ANC officials along with four other youth league leaders in August this year, to comments made about former president Thabo Mbeki and bringing about regime change in Botswana. He was found not guilty of sowing racial or political intolerance.

Malema had 14 days to appeal the disciplinary committee's sanctions, Hanekom said.

He has been suspended for 5 years and would continue to receive full pay until the appeal process was concluded.

Cosatu reacted to the news with a statement saying "Cosatu respects the ANC's internal processes and will not comment on the specific cases, but Cosatu reaffirms its commitment to discipline within the ANC and its leagues and condemns any members who undermine that discipline."

The IFP youth brigade said the ruling vindicated the IFPYB's previous calls for action to be taken against Malema. "The ANC leadership have stood idly by as Mr Malema contributed to the loss of confidence in the South Africa economy with his irresponsible, reckless, and senseless calls for nationalisation. We regret that a compulsory course on civility, good manners and economics 101 was not included."

African Christian Democratic Party leader Kenneth Meshoe said the ruling sent a strong message to the youth league that ill-discipline in any form would not be tolerated. "We particularly welcome the ANC's confirmation that discipline is 'the foundation for any intended course of action', that 'ill-discipline is not a cure for frustration', and that 'ill-discipline in the guise of militancy and robust expression' will not be permitted," Meshoe said.

Floyd Shivambu

Hanekom said the ANCYL's "arrogant" spokesman Floyd Shivambu also had to vacate his position in the youth league.

He was found guilty of two charges relating to swearing at a journalist and his press statement about regime change in Botswana. Shivambu's ANCYL membership was suspended for three years.

The National Press Club in Pretoria has welcomed the ruling against ANC Youth League spokesman Floyd Shivambu. "This ruling should be an example for other spokespersons," said chairman Yusuf Abramjee. "The media has a job to do and we will not sit back and watch our colleagues being abused."

The youth league's secretary general Sindiso Magaqa was found guilty of making a derogatory statement about Public Enterprise Minister Malusi Gigaba.

The NDC found he undermined the ANC and Gigaba's position as minister and placed foreign investment into South Africa at risk.

ANCYL deputy president Ronald Lamola, treasurer general Pule Mabe, Magaqa and deputy secretary general Kenetswe Mosenogi all had their youth league membership suspended for two years.

This sanction was suspended for three years, Hanekom said.

The Azanian People's Organisation youth (Azapoy) welcomed the suspension of both Malema and ANCYL spokesman Floyd Shivambu from the ANCYL.

"We view this as the best thing to have happened to South African politics of young people because the pair have been the worst thing to have ever graced the world of youth activism," leader Amukelani Ngobeni said.

Freedom Front Plus leader Pieter Mulder said South Africa was "a better place" for Malema's removal from the political arena. "Malema and Shivambu have without a doubt caused a lot of damage to South Africa internationally as well as nationally," said Mulder.

AfriForum welcomed the verdict and expressed the hope that the ANC would stand firm should Malema appeal his suspension.

According to Kallie Kriel, CEO of AfriForum, Malema's absence as a prominent figure in South African politics will give the country's residents an ideal opportunity to work on normalising community relations. "Malema has been the biggest polarising factor in the country for the past two years and without him on the scene, it will be much easier to promote mutual recognition and respect between communities," Kriel said.

South African stocks extended gains after the news of the suspension of Malema who has unnerved investors with his drive to nationalise mines. The rand also firmed slightly after the announcenment.

Judith February, head of Idasa's political monitoring unit, said most people had expected some "lightly, lightly" approach from the ANC's disciplinary committee. "This sends a strong message around issues of discipline, obviously in the larger democratic context of South Africa."

Julius Malema has vowed to appeal against his suspension as an ANC member, eNEWS has reported. Floyd Shivambu, was not immediately available for comment.

PRETORIA PURSUING TRADE WITH TURKEY WITHOUT AN FTA
PRETORIA, Nov 11 (NNN-BUANEWS) -- South Africa's Cabinet has chosen to pursue its bilateral trade agreements with Turkey outside of a Free Trade Agreement (FTA), it was announced here.

Turkey had proposed an FTA with South Africa, with the view to creating stronger trade and commercial ties through the faster movement of goods. Read more (http://namnewsnetwork.org/v2/read.php?id=175929)

Some more positive news...

S.Africa Sept manufacturing output up 7.7 pct y/y
Wed Nov 9, 2011 11:25am GMT

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa's manufacturing output grew by 7.7 percent year-on-year in volume terms in September compared with a revised 5.9 percent expansion in August, Statistics South Africa said on Wednesday.

Economists in a Reuters poll expected year-on-year output growth of 4.8 percent in September.

Compared with August, production in volume terms grew by a seasonally adjusted 0.2 percent in September. Output was down 0.1 percent in the three months to September compared with the previous three months.

- Reuters (http://af.reuters.com/article/investingNews/idAFJOE7A80AG20111109)

Very interesting reading, and just another reminder that stats should always be examined from as many angles as possible...

Source: Credit Suisse Global Wealth databook

Check this link for other tables and wotnot - http://www.sagoodnews.co.za/newsletter_archive/are_south_africans_becoming_wealthier_.html


Are South Africans becoming wealthier? Wednesday, 16 November 2011
by Steuart Pennington

Credit Suisse issued their second Global Wealth Report recently. They report that "global wealth increased from USD 195 trillion in 2010 to USD 231 trillion in 2011, led by growing wealth in South Africa, India, Australia, Chile and Singapore". They claim that their report covers all of the world’s adult citizens (estimated at 4.5 billion in 2011) and all of the world’s wealth. The report aims to provide a comprehensive global portrait of household wealth covering the whole spectrum of wealth holders from rich to poor, and examining in detail the level and patterns across countries and regions. So how are we doing in good old South Africa?

Definition

Household net worth or "wealth" is defined as the value of financial assets plus real assets (principally housing) owned by individuals, less their debts. Credit Suisse claim that their figures are obtained by applying cutting-edge techniques to data derived from a great variety of sources (methodology available in the Credit Suisse Global Wealth Databook). In South Africa there is significant information available from the South African Advertising Research Foundation and Household Survey data.

Why do this?

Wealth is one of the key components of the economic system. It is valued as a source of finance for future consumption, especially in retirement, and for reducing vulnerability to shocks like unemployment, ill-health and natural disasters. Wealth also enhances opportunity for the informal sector and entrepreneurial activities, when used either directly or as collateral for loans.

South Africa

Credit Suisse notes that "notable cases of emerging wealth are found in the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Chile, Turkey and South Africa". As the table below illustrates, South Africa is one of the "high" countries when it comes to annual wealth growth.

Annual wealth growth rates by country, 2000-09 and 2010-11

2010 – 2011 High (> 10%) Australia, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, South Africa
2010 – 2011 Medium (5% - 10%) Czech Republic, Poland
2010 – 2011 Low (< 5%) Bulgaria, France, Hungary, Romania, Russia, Spain, Turkey
2000 – 2009 High (> 10%) Australia, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, South Africa
2000 – 2009 Medium (5% - 10%) Canada, Korea, Mexico, Philippines, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand Egypt Austria, Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, UK
2000 – 2009 Low (< 5%) Argentina, Hong-Kong, Japan, Saudi Arabia Taiwan, USA

Source: James Davies, Rodrigo Lluberas and Anthony Shorrocks, Credit Suisse Global Wealth Databook 2011

As the map below illustrates, the world is divided up into four wealth regions:

Very Poor
USD 5 000 or less
Poor
USD 5 000 to USD 25 000
Emerging Wealth
USD 25 000 to USD 100 000
Wealthy
USD 100 000 plus

http://www.sagoodnews.co.za/images/stories/news_stories/2011/globalwealthmap_creditsuisse_top.jpg



South Africa, in the context of "emerging wealth" has joined the bank of countries with a mean wealth from USD 25 000 – USD 100 000 along with Chile, Brazil, Mexico and Namibia.

Credit Suisse reports, "in many respects, South Africa is the model for many other African economies. Its household wealth has grown vigorously over the last decade or so, quadrupling in value from USD 8 400 in the year 2000 to USD 34 300 by mid-2011. There were, however, noticeable fluctuations during this period. When wealth is expressed in terms of US dollars, the financial crisis appears to have caused a significant setback, from which South Africa has now fully recovered. However, when measured in South African rand, the 2008 trough is quite mild. A larger fall in proportional terms occurred in 2003.

"Unusually for a still developing country, household wealth is largely comprised of financial assets, which contribute more than 75% to the household portfolio. This reflects a vigorous stock market and sophisticated life insurance and pension industries, which are key aspects of the strong modern sector of the economy. Average real assets of USD 9 300 are not too much above the average level of debt (USD 5　900), in part the result of relatively low real estate prices. South Africa is also unusual among developing countries in having an official household sector balance sheet, which provides a more reliable basis for the wealth composition numbers.

"As in Indonesia, the distribution of wealth in South Africa is roughly similar to the distribution for the world as a whole, except that somewhat fewer individuals have wealth above USD 100 000 and correspondingly more are in the second-highest wealth group. Nevertheless, we estimate that there are 71 000 US dollar millionaires in SA, and that 116 000 South Africans are members of the global top 1% of wealth holders.

Poverty in SA, do we have a handle on it?

What interests me is that according to this research only 24% of households in South Africa have less than USD 1 000 of wealth. Yet, other research tells us that 40% of South Africans earn less than USD 1 per day and live in poverty. Surely, under the circumstances wealth accumulation should be impossible? This once again proves the point that we don’t understand true poverty in South Africa because we persist in measuring it in terms of income, and not in terms of assets. People lie about their income. Furthermore we tend to lump lower income, poor, very poor, poverty and abject poverty into one definition of "poverty". 45 million South Africans own cell phones, are 20 million of them living in poverty? I think not.

As the SAARF (AMPS) research shows, most South Africans are moving upwards from one LSM to another. It is claimed that five million citizens have entered the category of lower income from poor, and three million citizens have migrated from lower income to middle income. Our Gini Coefficient remains one of the "highest in the world" at 7.2. But this does not tell the story of this upward national migration in terms of wealth. It does however tell the story of the wealthy becoming wealthier and the poor becoming less poor, and possibly that the wealthy are becoming wealthier more so than the poor are becoming less poor!

The facts speak for themselves: nearly three million houses have been built sine 1994; electricity is available to 88% of households (up from 36% in 1994); 88% of households own a basket of white goods as well as a TV set; 70% of South Africans have bank accounts, up from 45% in 2004; 30% of South Africans own a car; the RICA registration process saw 40 million cell phones registered.

It is welcome news indeed that South Africa has grown its wealth amongst its citizens significantly over the past few years and is now ahead of the global average as figure 3 suggests.

That is not to say we don’t have considerable challenges with poverty and unemployment. We most certainly do. But as the Credit Suisse report points out, growing wealth is in and of itself an important source of entrepreneurship and the growth of the informal sector. My sense is that this positive change is happening here, as my Afrikaans teacher used to say, "behind our backs right in front of our eyes!"

Conclusion

Credit Suisse notes that the bottom half of the global population owns barely 1% of global wealth. In sharp contrast the richest 10% owns 84% of the world’s wealth, with the top 1% accounting for 44% of global assets. "Already we see signs that this is changing with the very rapid growth in some low-wealth countries. In time, we expect the distribution of the world’s wealth will become more even, with China and India likely to be the major catalysts toward such a trend".

The fact that South Africa is denoted as one of the countries where wealth is growing across the board makes for interesting reading and will I hope confound, if not perplex, the critics.

This information sourced from www.credit-suisse.com

JOHANNESBURG Nov 16 (Reuters) - Growth in South Africa's retail sales quickened to 8.3 percent year-on-year at constant prices in September from an upwardly revised 7.7 percent in August, Statistics South Africa said on Wednesday.
On a month-on-month basis retail sales were up 1.8 percent in September. Stats S.A. said retail sales grew by 6.3 percent in the three months to September, compared with the same period a year ago, also at constant prices.

Economists polled by Reuters last week expected retail sales growth to slow to 6.3 percent year-on-year in September.

(Reporting by Stella Mapenzauswa)


No wonder malls are still popping up everywhere, South Africans are still shopping up a storm

http://af.reuters.com/article/commoditiesNews/idAFJ8E7LV01220111116

No wonder malls are still popping up everywhere, South Africans are still shopping up a storm

I wish South Africans would ditch the mall and head back to the high street.

Not yet, maybe in about a decade, people will grow tired of malls and re-discover the high street. But SA malls are not that bad, personally I like the new type of hybrid malls with outside sitting areas, like Melrose Arch, Rosebank. Best of both worlds IMO

Very interesting reading, and just another reminder that stats should always be examined from as many angles as possible...

Source: Credit Suisse Global Wealth databook

Check this link for other tables and wotnot - http://www.sagoodnews.co.za/newsletter_archive/are_south_africans_becoming_wealthier_.html


Are South Africans becoming wealthier? Wednesday, 16 November 2011
by Steuart Pennington

Credit Suisse issued their second Global Wealth Report recently. They report that "global wealth increased from USD 195 trillion in 2010 to USD 231 trillion in 2011, led by growing wealth in South Africa, India, Australia, Chile and Singapore". They claim that their report covers all of the world’s adult citizens (estimated at 4.5 billion in 2011) and all of the world’s wealth. The report aims to provide a comprehensive global portrait of household wealth covering the whole spectrum of wealth holders from rich to poor, and examining in detail the level and patterns across countries and regions. So how are we doing in good old South Africa?

Definition

Household net worth or "wealth" is defined as the value of financial assets plus real assets (principally housing) owned by individuals, less their debts. Credit Suisse claim that their figures are obtained by applying cutting-edge techniques to data derived from a great variety of sources (methodology available in the Credit Suisse Global Wealth Databook). In South Africa there is significant information available from the South African Advertising Research Foundation and Household Survey data.

Why do this?

Wealth is one of the key components of the economic system. It is valued as a source of finance for future consumption, especially in retirement, and for reducing vulnerability to shocks like unemployment, ill-health and natural disasters. Wealth also enhances opportunity for the informal sector and entrepreneurial activities, when used either directly or as collateral for loans.

South Africa

Credit Suisse notes that "notable cases of emerging wealth are found in the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Chile, Turkey and South Africa". As the table below illustrates, South Africa is one of the "high" countries when it comes to annual wealth growth.

Annual wealth growth rates by country, 2000-09 and 2010-11

2010 – 2011 High (> 10%) Australia, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, South Africa
2010 – 2011 Medium (5% - 10%) Czech Republic, Poland
2010 – 2011 Low (< 5%) Bulgaria, France, Hungary, Romania, Russia, Spain, Turkey
2000 – 2009 High (> 10%) Australia, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, South Africa
2000 – 2009 Medium (5% - 10%) Canada, Korea, Mexico, Philippines, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand Egypt Austria, Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, UK
2000 – 2009 Low (< 5%) Argentina, Hong-Kong, Japan, Saudi Arabia Taiwan, USA

Source: James Davies, Rodrigo Lluberas and Anthony Shorrocks, Credit Suisse Global Wealth Databook 2011

As the map below illustrates, the world is divided up into four wealth regions:

Very Poor
USD 5 000 or less
Poor
USD 5 000 to USD 25 000
Emerging Wealth
USD 25 000 to USD 100 000
Wealthy
USD 100 000 plus

http://www.sagoodnews.co.za/images/stories/news_stories/2011/globalwealthmap_creditsuisse_top.jpg



South Africa, in the context of "emerging wealth" has joined the bank of countries with a mean wealth from USD 25 000 – USD 100 000 along with Chile, Brazil, Mexico and Namibia.

Credit Suisse reports, "in many respects, South Africa is the model for many other African economies. Its household wealth has grown vigorously over the last decade or so, quadrupling in value from USD 8 400 in the year 2000 to USD 34 300 by mid-2011. There were, however, noticeable fluctuations during this period. When wealth is expressed in terms of US dollars, the financial crisis appears to have caused a significant setback, from which South Africa has now fully recovered. However, when measured in South African rand, the 2008 trough is quite mild. A larger fall in proportional terms occurred in 2003.

"Unusually for a still developing country, household wealth is largely comprised of financial assets, which contribute more than 75% to the household portfolio. This reflects a vigorous stock market and sophisticated life insurance and pension industries, which are key aspects of the strong modern sector of the economy. Average real assets of USD 9 300 are not too much above the average level of debt (USD 5　900), in part the result of relatively low real estate prices. South Africa is also unusual among developing countries in having an official household sector balance sheet, which provides a more reliable basis for the wealth composition numbers.

"As in Indonesia, the distribution of wealth in South Africa is roughly similar to the distribution for the world as a whole, except that somewhat fewer individuals have wealth above USD 100 000 and correspondingly more are in the second-highest wealth group. Nevertheless, we estimate that there are 71 000 US dollar millionaires in SA, and that 116 000 South Africans are members of the global top 1% of wealth holders.

Poverty in SA, do we have a handle on it?

What interests me is that according to this research only 24% of households in South Africa have less than USD 1 000 of wealth. Yet, other research tells us that 40% of South Africans earn less than USD 1 per day and live in poverty. Surely, under the circumstances wealth accumulation should be impossible? This once again proves the point that we don’t understand true poverty in South Africa because we persist in measuring it in terms of income, and not in terms of assets. People lie about their income. Furthermore we tend to lump lower income, poor, very poor, poverty and abject poverty into one definition of "poverty". 45 million South Africans own cell phones, are 20 million of them living in poverty? I think not.

As the SAARF (AMPS) research shows, most South Africans are moving upwards from one LSM to another. It is claimed that five million citizens have entered the category of lower income from poor, and three million citizens have migrated from lower income to middle income. Our Gini Coefficient remains one of the "highest in the world" at 7.2. But this does not tell the story of this upward national migration in terms of wealth. It does however tell the story of the wealthy becoming wealthier and the poor becoming less poor, and possibly that the wealthy are becoming wealthier more so than the poor are becoming less poor!

The facts speak for themselves: nearly three million houses have been built sine 1994; electricity is available to 88% of households (up from 36% in 1994); 88% of households own a basket of white goods as well as a TV set; 70% of South Africans have bank accounts, up from 45% in 2004; 30% of South Africans own a car; the RICA registration process saw 40 million cell phones registered.

It is welcome news indeed that South Africa has grown its wealth amongst its citizens significantly over the past few years and is now ahead of the global average as figure 3 suggests.

That is not to say we don’t have considerable challenges with poverty and unemployment. We most certainly do. But as the Credit Suisse report points out, growing wealth is in and of itself an important source of entrepreneurship and the growth of the informal sector. My sense is that this positive change is happening here, as my Afrikaans teacher used to say, "behind our backs right in front of our eyes!"

Conclusion

Credit Suisse notes that the bottom half of the global population owns barely 1% of global wealth. In sharp contrast the richest 10% owns 84% of the world’s wealth, with the top 1% accounting for 44% of global assets. "Already we see signs that this is changing with the very rapid growth in some low-wealth countries. In time, we expect the distribution of the world’s wealth will become more even, with China and India likely to be the major catalysts toward such a trend".

The fact that South Africa is denoted as one of the countries where wealth is growing across the board makes for interesting reading and will I hope confound, if not perplex, the critics.

This information sourced from www.credit-suisse.com



Very interesting! Thanks for posting!

Glad to see my country Colombia in there :banana:

http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcThwWDK_268lyy-HfFovT5l2SNw2Uv5pSk0nQCqzr59_vL-zqFCE-EBpmZzCg

Two provinces near economic collapse
CHANDRÉ PRINCE and AMUKELANI CHAUKE | 05 December, 2011 23:5024

In an historic first, the ANC-led government has admitted that two provinces are on the brink of economic collapse and in dire need of financial bailout.

It emerged yesterday that widescale maladministration and possible criminal intent in Limpopo, Free State and Gauteng has forced the National Treasury to dip into reserves amounting to billions of rands in an effort to prevent a looming crisis.

The economic embarrassment has forced the cabinet to place eight departments in Limpopo and Free State under administration, effectively meaning that the National Treasury will play big brother to their finances.

In a shocking statement, cabinet spokesman Jimmy Manyi revealed how the three provinces - with Limpopo faring the worst - plunged into financial difficulties, forcing the government to urgently review provincial spending and devise elegant solutions to a situation analysts describe as "embarrassing to the country".

A cash-strapped Limpopo alone has asked Treasury for a R1-billion bailout on top of a R757.3-million overdraft to pay for November salaries.

Gauteng needs R627-million to pay for salary increases and faces "chronic problems" with large accrual and other financial disasters. It is not clear how much Free State has requested from the Treasury.

Manyi said the cabinet had been "concerned" about the state of financial management and governance in the three provinces for some time and that the drastic move was necessitated by trends of unsatisfactory spending, overspending and challenges with supply chain management.

"The Minister of Finance Pravin Gordhan was asked by cabinet to urgently review the situation in Limpopo and other provinces and report back to cabinet on proposed actions to be taken to improve the financial situation and its impact on service delivery and provincial functions," said Manyi.

The intervention, as decided by the cabinet yesterday, will entail:

Key departments in Limpopo and Free State being placed under administration;
The cabinet assuming responsibility for Limpopo's treasury, education, transport and roads, health and public works departments;
The cabinet issuing directives for Free State's treasury and police and roads and transport departments;
Gauteng signing agreements with ministers of health and finance to address financial challenges in the provincial health department;
Gauteng being assisted with financial management and supply chain management issues;
Forensic investigations with strict deadlines to be carried out; and
A monitoring committee under Gordhan's leadership, assisted by six other national ministers.
And though the ANC might have egg on its face over its failure to adequately deal with its finances in the three provinces it holds majority power over, the cabinet said heads would roll if the investigations uncover any illegal conduct.

MECs, heads of departments, chief financial officers and other appropriate officials will also be replaced by the national acting deployees on a case-by-case basis.

According to Manyi, a cash- strapped Limpopo had used up its R757.3-million overdraft facility with the Corporation for Public Deposits and had asked that its facility be increased by R1-billion to pay salaries and wages on November 23.

"This request was declined but alternative arrangements were made for an early transfer of their equitable share," said Manyi.

Efficient Group chief economist Dawie Roodt said yesterday: "I don't think government realises the kind of damage something like this does to the economy. At the moment, as things stand, we are barely managing ... we are not in trouble as yet, but we are not comfortable," said Roodt.

He attributes the provinces' financial woes to incompetence and the ANC's cadre deployment tendencies.

What's the growth prospects this year? With a two slow quarters (1.3% and 1.4%) I wouldn't be surprised if growth this year fell below 3%. Any government policy to boost growth towards 7%? Stimulus?

^^Still 3.1%, IMO no stimulus is necessary as the slowdown is down to exogenous factors namely Europe cannot is no longer importing, in fact exports to Europe have collapsed. we just have to sit tight and keep reform, we should not cut interest rates as currency will collapse.

RE: Stimulus, there's plenty going on regarding financial reforms, tax reforms, infrastructure development (in fact the freight rail and exports to ports have been at record highs). And lastly of course is the whole greening of the economy, this should increase the efficiency of the economy as we should be able produce more GDP for a given amount of coal or energy input.

Employment up in November
Thursday, 08 December 2011
Total employment grew at its fastest rate in eight months in November, the latest Adcorp Employment Index has found. According to the index, released on Thursday, employment grew at an annual rate of 3.41% in November.

All employment categories reported growth, the fastest being the informal sector (4%), temporary work (3.8%) and permanent jobs (2.8%). Agency work lagged behind at 2%, possibly reflecting "legislative and regulatory uncertainties" regarding labour broking.

Significant job growth was recorded in the distribution and logistics sector at 18.1%, the retail sector at 8.7% and financial services 8.2%. By contrast, sharp declines in employment were observed in mining (-15.7%) and manufacturing at (-5.4%).

Demand for skilled workers increased sharply, notably managers and professionals. This reflected the economy's ongoing re-orientation toward high value-added services sectors. Demand for clerks (9.1%) and service workers (4.7%) also increased.

SA - the Good News via SAPA

Bloemfontein - Thanks to South Africans buying cars, chatting more on cellphones, surfing the internet and having reduced their debts over the past year, the South African economy began to turn around in October after a three-month contraction.


Four of the five provincial economies for which Sake24 and BoE Private Clients compile barometers strengthened over the past quarter. Only the Western Cape (2.5% down on three months ago) is still in decline.


All provinces saw their trade indices rising, with Gauteng - 9.4% up year-on-year (y/y) - doing best. This index measures vehicle, petrol, retail and wholesale sales, as well as tourism.


Vehicle sales remained steady, with the Free State (30.5% up y/y) performing best.


"The consumer is the harbinger of the economy, but will also first feel the impact of higher inflation or interest rates," said Mike Schüssler of Economists.co.za, who compiles the barometers.


In the fourth quarter the manufacturing sector countrywide began to shake off the negative effects of the strike season, and the healthy Eastern Cape motor industry's surge turned around seven months of negative growth.


Schüssler said he is seriously disappointed in the mining indices, considering how the gold price has strengthened this year.


In Gauteng (11.6% down on a year ago) and the Free State (10.2% down), in particular, there was a marked decline. Over the past 11 years mining's contribution to the country's gross domestic product (GDP) has declined sharply (see graph), and the country has derived little benefit from the global spike in commodity prices.


"This year saw the highest gold price in history, and the fact that our mining was unable to adjust to it indicates uncertainty in the sector," said Schüssler.


Government is also beginning to apply the brakes to its expenditure across the country, with KwaZulu-Natal (a mere 4.7% up on a year ago) having recorded the smallest rise in October. In the Free State (15.7% up) the increase was greatest.


"The fact that government is now spending less than earlier this year shows that it may have been spending ahead of budget."


The national communications index rose 26.4% in October. "The cellphone revolution has still not spent itself and its good increase is a further indication of a consumer-driven economy."


There was a national decline in the number of civil indebtedness cases, and an increase in asset management activity.


Schüssler said it appears South Africans’ indebtedness has improved slightly, thanks in particular to the low interest rate. "The economy, however, remains volatile and we are unlikely to see growth of more than 2% in the immediate future," he said.

SA third-quarter expenditure surges



Pretoria - Spending growth in South Africa’s economy accelerated sharply in the third quarter as household spending accelerated and investment spending by both the public and private sector picked up.


In its December Quarterly Bulletin, the South African Reserve Bank said on Thursday growth in aggregate real gross domestic expenditure quickened sharply to an annualised 4.2% in the third quarter from 1.1% in the second quarter.


Household expenditure growth picked up pace in the third quarter, rising to 3.7% compared with an annualised 3.3% previously.


“This stronger pace of increase could be attributed to brisk spending on durable goods and services alongside more moderate spending on semi and non-durable goods,” the bank said.


The bank said real disposable income grew by 3.9% in the third quarter from 3.5% previously. Growth in household debt moderated on account of slower rise in mortgage advances.


The ratio of household debt to disposable income inched lower to 75.0% from 75.8% in the second quarter, while debt service costs edged down to 6.9% of disposable income in line with steady interest rates that have stayed at 30-year lows since the end of 2010.


On the investment side, the Reserve Bank said a faster pace of investment was recorded in both the public and private sector and as a result, gross fixed capital formation rose to 5.6% compared with 5.0% in the second quarter.


Investment growth contracted in 2010 as the economy was slowly recovering from a recession in 2009 - its first in almost two decades.


In the private sector, farmers increased their spending on machinery in anticipation of a better wheat crop and a relatively favourable maize price.


Several car manufacturers planning to launch new models in 2012 also raised spending on warehouses and machinery and equipment.


Investment by public corporations rose to an annualised 6.3% from 5.4%, due to robust spending in electricity and transport sectors.


The bank said state-owned logistics company Transnet and electricity firm Eskom spent on machinery and equipment for ongoing projects to improve infrastructure


http://www.fin24.com/Economy/SA-third-quarter-expenditure-surges-20111208

SA loses 14 000 jobsFri, 09 Dec 2011

South Africa lost 14,000 jobs in April, May and June this year, the department of labour said on Thursday.

"The economy has lost 14,000 jobs in the first quarter of 2011 after a gain of 157,000 in the fourth quarter of 2010," departmental spokesman Page Boikanyo said in a statement summarising the findings of the Annual Labour Market Bulletin for the financial year of 2010/2011.

"Despite reasonable economic growth, the South African economy remained deeply inequitable with the highest official unemployment rate [of 25 percent] of any middle income country."
Boikanyo said more than a million jobs were lost in South Africa during the world-wide economic recession.
Data from the Unemployment Insurance Fund indicated that the casualisation of labour continued in the South Africa job market.

Most claimants said they became unemployed when their contracts ended, while others said they had been dismissed or retrenched.

Boikanyo said the Commission for Conciliation and Mediation and Arbitration handled 154,279 cases involving industrial action through strikes during the 2010/2011 financial year.

The report suggested that the country should strengthen domestic industries such as agriculture and construction.

These sectors would be able to provide employment for low and semi-skilled jobless South Africans.

The report found that small, medium and micro enterprises needed better access to credit.

The ALMB is produced by the department of labour's labour market policy unit.

Marsupalami,

Had you the unemployment benefits in South Africa there when a person loses sound employ? If yes how much on average by month in dollars?

why dollars? dollars is for countries that have weak currencies and need to peg to a known currency. Why not report in local currencies which then allows a local buying power comparison. This obsession with the USD is strange