Cape Times 2021-06-14

Siphelele Dludla siphelele.dludla@in.co.za THE INVESTMENT case for SA Inc got a much-needed boost last week as the government moved to implement vital aspects of its economic recovery plan by announcing long-awaited reforms. These included a strategic equity partner for SAA as well as lifting the cap on power self-generation, which business leaders and analysts welcomed. Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan took the reform programme a notch higher on Friday when he announced the preferred strategic equity partner for SAA. Gordhan said the government would relinquish control of the strugg- ling airline to a private company, Tsakatso Consortium, after 19 months of uncertainty. “The objective of bringing in an equity partner to SAA is to augment it with the required technical, financial and operational expertise to ensure a sustainable airline,”…

Dineo Faku dineo.faku@inl.co.za THE steel master plan 1.0, a joint initiative by regulators, industry and labour, has proposed the establishment of a Steel Industry Development Fund to support critlical industry projects as one of the measures to revive the steel industry’s fortunes. The fund will be established with funding sourced from a small levy on all primary steel sold in South Africa, according to the plan. Speaking at the signing ceremony of the steel master plan in Germiston, east of Joburg, on Friday, Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition (the dtic) Ebrahim Patel said the finishing touches were being made to the modalities of the fund. “The idea is that the steel development fund will be run effectively by the industry. It will be a resource that is available to…

GOLD FIELDS’ South Deep mine in Westonaria has agreed to hike wages by an average 6.5 percent a year over the 3-year period with the National Union of Mineworkers (Num) and the United Association of South Africa. South Deep said on Friday that the agreement also comprised of a range of non-wage related issues, including an alignment of leave and shift arrangements and changes to other conditions of employment with a view to standardising them across all occupational levels. Num’s Pretoria-Witwatersrand-Vereeniging regional chairperson, Ndlela Radebe, said the wage hike would go a long way to improving the livelihoods of workers and their families, while sustaining the business and ensuring sustainable job security. “Considering the difficult circumstances South Africa and the world are facing due to the Covid-19 pandemic, we…

SOUTH African consumer debt surged to R1.9 trillion with R20.4 billion in value defaulted for the first time over the period January to March this year, according to Experian South Africa’s Consumer Default Index. Experian Africa chief decision analytics officer Jaco van Jaarsveldt said on Friday that the rate of people who defaulted on their loans for the first time increased in the first quarter of this year. “This deterioration is primarily due to the increase in business volumes during the latter parts of 2020 when strict lock- down rules were relaxed at the end of the second Covid wave, particularly for credit cards and personal loans over the Black Friday and Festive season period in 2020. The combination of the economy opening up and the extended Black Friday ‘month’…

MURRAY & Roberts (M&R) said Boipelo Mining Contractors, a joint venture between M&R (49 percent) and Amandla (51 percent), has been awarded a R3.2 billion contract to provide underground mining services at Arnot Coal Mine in Mpumalanga. Boipelo Mining Contractors is a B-BBEE Level 1 underground mining contractor. Murray & Roberts Cementation would be the active partner with Amandla on the project. M&R said the group understood the global implications of climate change and was committed to reducing its carbon footprint and growing its service offerings in the cleaner energy sector. “Considering the shortage of electricity in South Africa and Eskom’s dependence on its fleet of coal-fired power stations to generate electricity to meet base-load demand, the group has decided to limit its coal-mining service offering to the…

EDWARD WEST edward.west@inl.co.za THE INTERGOVERNMENTAL Fintech Working Group (IFWG) published a position paper on crypto assets on Friday that provides a framework for how the assets will be regulated in future in a “phased and structured manner”. The National Treasury initially issued a statement on crypto assets in 2014 as a joint initiative with the South African Reserve Bank (SARB), the Financial Services Board (now the Financial Sector Conduct Authority), the South African Revenue Service and the Financial Intelligence Centre. The statement warned about the risks associated with the use of crypto assets for the purpose of transacting or investing, and advised users to apply caution in this regard. The cautionary tone was adopted because there was no specific legis- lation for the use of crypto assets, and at the…