Category: Economy
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Municipalities owe Eskom R78bn – and energy minister is pessimistic about recovery
South African electricity and energy minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa says South Africa’s municipalities owe power utility Eskom R78-billion. At a recent media conference, the minister expressed doubt that Eskom would be able to recover these funds. Municipal debt has increased almost six times since 2018. Just 28 municipalities collectively accounted for R26.7-billion in March last year.…
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SA steps up to meet growing global demand for avos
The world can’t get enough avocados, and South African farmers are capitalising on the soaring demand for this popular superfruit. Exports have increased by 63% over the past decade, according to the SA Avocado Growers’ Association. About 74,4000 tonnes of avocados were exported last year, just 9,500 shy of 2018’s record. ITC figures show the…
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100 days of keeping the lights on signals improved power stability for SA
With just 83 days of loadshedding in South Africa so far this year, 2024 is on track to be one of the best years for reduced power cuts. Fuelling the optimism is the announcement last week that Kusile’s unit 5 was now in operation, adding 800MW to the grid.
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Tourism recovery: Visitors to Table Mountain, cableway are on the rise
The number of visitors to the Table Mountain National Park climbed to 2.8-million in 2023. A 56% increase on 2022, or an additional 1-million visitors. The national park, home to the iconic Table Mountain, had 3.2-million visitors in 2019. Also on the rise are visitors to the Table Mountain Aerial Cableway. Numbers shot up 44%…
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SA’s low-cost housing programme on shaky ground
Just 42,773 government-subsidised houses were built in South Africa in the 2023/24 financial year. That’s an 82% decline compared with the 235,635 houses built 26 years ago in 1998/99. About 10% of government-subsidised houses were recorded as having weak walls and roofs, according to Statistics SA’s 2023 General Household Survey. Mpumalanga and the Western Cape had…
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ZA inflation steadies
Annual consumer price inflation was unchanged at 5.2% in May in line with some expectations, Statistics SA reported on Wednesday. The annual inflation rate of goods last month was 5.7%, unchanged from April, and for services, it was 4.7%, up from 4.6%. Food and non-alcoholic beverages inflation remained steady at 4.7% in May, unchanged from…
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Nigerians face crippling food price increases
Nigerians are facing steep increases in food prices as inflation figures hit record highs. In May 2024 food inflation increased to 40.66%, an almost 16 percentage point increase on the May 2023 inflation rate of 24.82%, Punch reports. Headline inflation (covering all consumer goods) increased to 33.95% according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).…
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How Eskom and other state-owned companies drain the government’s coffers
In its Budget Review 2024, the Treasury included a section titled ‘How state-owned company support has become a drain on the fiscus’. It showed how in 2020, support given to these companies, which include Eskom, South African Airways (SAA), Denel, the Post Office and Transnet, reached R59.8-billion and has not dropped below that level since.…