While the 2010 football FIFA World Cup continues to crop up in conversation across industries in South Africa, it dominates the narrative in the construction sector unlike any other. The event, for which the government invested R28bn ($3.4bn), has become the major reference point for contractors, a peak from which their fortunes rapidly declined. A...
Since the establishment of a democratic South Africa in 1994, and the creation of nine provinces from the original four, the role of regional government has become a prominent topic in political debate in the country. In the 1990s several parties called for a greater role for provincial authorities, to counter the power of the central government in...
Since 2009, murmurs about shale gas potential in the Karoo Basin have become a cacophony of controversy. On the one hand, international and domestic hydrocarbons firms are calling for significant exploration efforts to establish whether the expected deposits are commercially viable, suggesting that any major discoveries could be game-changers for...
Coping with rising demand in the face of years of underinvestment in infrastructure is a key challenge for South Africa’s energy sector. With power outages dominating headlines in 2008, maintaining a stable supply of energy to industry, business and domestic consumers is crucial to the country’s future economic growth. South Africa has also moved...
Critical in the production of steel, iron ore, which represents around 95% of all metal used each year – is a major potential growth area for South Africa. According to a March 2011 report released by Kumba Iron Ore (KIO), a South African unit of London-headquartered Anglo American and the fifth-largest seaborne iron ore supplier in the world, the...
Thanks to its economic centrality South Africa’s mining industry has long been the focus of political rhetoric, which has sometimes resulted in polarising debates. Calls from radical elements in the African National Congress (ANC) over the course of 2011 for the nationalisation of mines have badly shaken investor confidence and – while these calls...
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