South Africa

South Africa’s industrial policy has been underpinned by the Industrial Policy Action Plan (IPAP), which is launched each year by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) on a three-year rolling basis and covering a 10-year outlook. The latest iteration, which will cover the period from 2014 to 2017, will place greater emphasis on trade competitiveness by directing...

For over a century, up until the fall of apartheid, the entirety of South Africa’s mining sector was controlled by a small selection of diversified conglomerates, each governed by a group financing model. New, foreign or specialised participation in the sector was a rarity, as the incumbent mining finance houses held titles and rights over unexploited assets.

Industrial action has become an annual event for a number of South African sectors, leading to what is referred to as “strike season” during the second and third quarters of the year. In the mining sector, particularly in the platinum industry, the last couple of years have seen an escalation in terms of the size and scope of labour unrest, which could have significant...

Low-income earners are typically the population segment most negatively affected by unexpected adverse events, and they also tend to be the group with the lowest insurance coverage. While South Africa’s micro-insurance penetration compares favourably – around 30% of South African adults use micro-insurance compared to less than 1% in the rest of sub-Saharan Africa – there is...

It seems that every year in South Africa, newspaper headlines are filled with a pending shift in policy direction for the mining sector, but rarely with any results. In 2012 fears were of a populist-driven move towards resource nationalisation, which was subsequently quashed by President Jacob Zuma’s administration, while 2013 saw concerns over a new resources tax.

South Africa’s mining industry is the fifth largest in the world and the country has around 80% of global platinum reserves, 11% of gold reserves, and some of the largest supplies of chrome ore and manganese. The sector’s contribution to GDP has, however, been on a steady decline, falling to just under 5% in 2013 from 11% two decades earlier. Reversing this trend is a top...