by Johan Burger 2018 has been an interesting year for Africa, with various events and trends becoming visible. 2016 saw the effects of the slowdown of China’s economic growth due to its rebalancing of its economy and the end of the commodity price super cycle. 2017 brought some relief. In Africa, 2018 demonstrated a number […]
Category Archives: South Africa News
South Africa News
by Johan Burger The NTU-SBF Centre for African Studies publishes a weekly newsletter on issues relevant to Africa. This paper is based on issues addressed in the newsletter. Manufacturing in Africa Manufacturing and industrialisation are the current buzzwords for transforming Africa’s economies. In order to reduce any dependence on the extraction and sale of raw […]
by Johan Burger The NTU-SBF Centre for African Studies publishes a weekly newsletter on issues relevant to Africa. This paper is based on issues addressed in the newsletter. The year 2018 saw numerous cases of economic development on the African continent. This would include trade, etc. Africa The US$2 trillion-plus Sub-Saharan Africa economy continues to […]
by Johan Burger This paper addresses events and trends in the agriculture sector in Africa for 2018. It is based on the media articles addressed in the Friday@Noon weekly newsletters of the NTU-SBF Centre for African Studies in Singapore. These are by no means meant to constitute an exhaustive list of developments. General Agriculture in […]
by Johan Burger The NTU-SBF Centre for African Studies publishes a weekly newsletter on issues relevant to Africa. This paper is based on issues addressed in the newsletter. Various mining initiatives and challenges occurred during 2018. Below is a snapshot of some of it. This is by no means an exhaustive list. Tanzania Tanzania wants […]
by Johan Burger The NTU-SBF Centre for African Studies publishes a weekly newsletter on issues relevant to Africa. This paper is based on issues addressed in the newsletter. Regional integration has become a high profile intervention and is seen as the route to economic integration and increasing intra-African trade. Some commentators are of the opinion […]
“Whole communities and towns can become 100% energy independent” “Mini grids could very quickly sort out a lot of the biggest challenges that South Africa is having with its energy supply at the moment” says Dr Sam Duby, Africa Director for TFE Energy and mini grid expert. He adds: “deregulation would open a market for […]
The invention of plastic has changed the world in so many ways – for both better and worse – that it’s hard to picture modern life without it. Instinctively, we might think a plastic-free world could only be an improvement, but that would be to ignore the extent to which plastic is interwoven in almost […]
Easy of Doing Business in Thekwini (Durban) Easy of Doing Business in Cape TownSouth Africa is a country of a mixed economy. It has a relatively high gross domestic product than other countries in Africa. Despite having a mixed economy and high GDP, South Africa has a problem of poverty and unemployment. Business is a […]
By Annamarie Bindenagel Šehović Analysis in Brief: Global health security lies at the intersection of Europe and Africa, between inherited state-based intervention and a new regional, global approach. Given this, it is vital to redefine health security and it is imperative that this new definition include cross-border populations. Likewise, knowledge exchange in both definitional scope […]
“SAVING WATER GETS A SMART SOLUTION“ Cape Town’s drought has changed most South Africans’ thinking around water usage and the future of the country’s water supplies. Government tariffs and self-regulation has meant a re-think in our relationship with water and how we go about using, saving and re-purposing this scarce resource. A Cape Town company, […]
Undeniably, digital transformation continues to dramatically change the way we live and do business – almost daily it seems. Globally, the retail industry is one of the top industries in which we are seeing massive strides and changes when it comes to the adoption of technology, the evolving customer journey, and innovation in terms of […]
The Port of Maputo in Mozambique has excellent development potential. It is located along the east coast of Southern Africa, to the north of the Ports of Durban and Richards Bay. It is one of several ports that connect via road and railway line to South Africa’s mega-metropolis of Johannesburg that is still Africa’s leading […]
The majority of maritime ports worldwide offer the option of intermodal transfer of containers between maritime and railway transportation, and at some ports, the port railway may serve as the means by which to undertake ship-to-ship transfers of containers. Railway technology, including parallel railway tracks, offers the possibility of developing super-wide railway cars that can […]
By Peter Eigen, founder of Transparency International The first Regional Roundtable on Infrastructure Governance was held in Cape Town at the beginning of November. Peter Eigen, founder of Transparency International (www.Transparency.org), who addressed the event, reflects on the vital importance of openness and transparency for successful and sustainable infrastructure projects. Corruption is nothing new and it’s certainly […]
Thabo Mpelele, Sales Manager: Southern & Eastern Africa, Orange Business Services Despite being plagued by economic uncertainty and socio-economic issues, Africa remains a promising long-term growth opportunity for business; with multinational corporations (MNCs) the world over continuing to enter into the region. When drawing up development and expansion plans any enterprise is faced with the fact that […]
James Maposa Director Consultant Intergroup Brand Science (formerly Interbrand Africa) I’ve often heard people describe products and services coming out of our continent as African. Examples include African attire, African cuisine, African print and so on. For those who’ve been lucky enough to have travelled our beloved continent you’d understand the problems that come with […]
Electric power arrived at Cape Town around 1900 with the construction of a coal-fired, steam-driven power station located near the Victoria and Alfred dockyard area. The location offered 2-advantages in that the power station was close to the unloading area of coal ships that could sail from Durban. The second advantage was that close proximity […]
James Maposa Director Consultant Intergroup Brand Science (formerly Interbrand Africa) I recently read an article that reported on South Africa’s most valued brands for 2016. The country’s top-10 brands were MTN, Vodacom, Sasol, Standard Bank, Woolworths, FNB, Absa, Nedbank, Investec and Mediclinic; with Multichoice bubbling under at number 11. For me what was missing in […]
Summary: The thermal capacity of seawater off Cape Town’s coast can be applied to reduce the energy consumption of commercial scale refrigerators and air-conditioners as well as sustain the energy efficient operation of refrigeration-based technology that extracts potable water from humid air. Introduction: During successive summer seasons that extend over a period of decades, the […]
by Matt Radcliffe .pdf Acrobat Reader Abstract In the two decades since the end of Apartheid, the international community has perceived South Africa to be the most influential country in Sub-Saharan Africa. The country continues to play an important economic role on the continent and is a driving political force in the African Union (AU). […]
By Johan Burger, NTU-SBF Centre for African Studies The Espinaca Journey At the age of 24, Lufefe Nomjana from Khayelitsha, Cape Town, in South Africa, came up with a plan to add spinach to foods consumed daily, like bread. He realised that a lot of people in his neighbourhood were obese, yet malnourished! They […]