southafrica Archives - African Financial & Economic Data

South Africa’s unemployment stays at 14-year high in second quarter

South Africa’s unemployment rate stayed at a 14-year high in the second quarter, with the statistics agency saying on Monday the country was in a “precarious position” of not creating enough jobs to make a dent in poverty.

The unemployment rate remained unchanged at 27.7 percent of the labour force in the second three months of this year, with the absolute number of unemployed down slightly to 6.177 million from 6.214 million, data from the statistics office showed.

Africa’s most industrialised economy has sunk into recession and had its credit rating downgraded to junk by two of the three main credit rating agencies. In July Stats SA said nearly a fourth of all households are in poverty.

Statistician General Pali Lehohla said the real economy, which includes mining and manufacturing, was not creating enough employment.

“We are in a very precarious position as South Africa in as far as exiting poverty. The type of strategy that can make us exit poverty is when people are working,” Lehohla said.

“This kind of poverty cannot be resolved by social grants and the like. That type pf poverty is solved if people are doing work and being productive,” Lehohla said.

Although South Africa’s economy contracted for a second successive quarter in March, economists expect positive growth in 2017, but warn that political turmoil and regulatory uncertainty will continue to hamper investor sentiment.

Chief economist for Africa at Standard Charted, Razia Khan, said agriculture and mining were the only sectors that grew meaningfully in the first quarter of this year but actually experienced job losses in the second quarter.

“With a significant uplift to growth performance unlikely to be on the horizon just yet, there is little to suggest a meaningful pick-up in job creation for some time,” she said.

The rand shrugged off the unemployment print, with market focus on the no-confidence motion against President Jacob Zuma on Tuesday. As of 0825 GMT, the rand was trading at 13.4025 per dollar, 0.13 percent firmer than its close on Friday.

Zuma faces a no-confidence vote in parliament on Tuesday brought by opposition parties. The ruling African National Congress says its members would rally behind Zuma and vote against the motion.

Additional reporting by Olivia Kumwenda-Mtambo, Editing by James Macharia and Angus MacSwan

Article from CNBCAfrica

South Africa Should Consider Help From the IMF to Fix Its Economy

The prognosis that the South African economy is in dire straits is pretty obvious even to the untrained eye. The solution to the country’s present predicament is also pretty much understood. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has recently produced a comprehensive view which deserves to be considered.

The IMF identifies three key ailments as causes of the country’s anaemic economic growth. These are low consumer and investor confidence and policy uncertainty.

Continued slow growth should be a matter of grave concern and ought to be treated as an emergency.

Thus far the short and medium term outlook suggests that growth outcomes will continue to be pedestrian. What is even more worrying is that over the past four years global economic growth has gained momentum, suggesting that the solution to South Africa’s vanishing growth lies in the country.

The new minister of finance, Malusi Gigaba, recently hinted that South Africa may be compelled to seek assistance from the IMF. I think the conditions are right for serious consideration of the proposal even though IMF programmes are not very popular with politicians.

There are a number of reasons for this. Requests for IMF assistance suggest that those who manage the domestic economy have failed. The fund’s programmes also come with clearly defined milestones, often described as “conditionalities”. But in most instances, these are well-intentioned and aimed at success.

It’s better to enter an IMF programme early before the situation becomes frantic. As medical doctors might argue, it is easier to deal with an ailment in the earlier stages before it reaches an advanced stage.

Desperate situation

The alternative to asking for help now would be continued poor growth outcomes which would have serious social and economic costs.

The country’s poor economic growth record spawned a number of problems.

A shrinking economy means tax revenue shortfalls. The fiscal policy response would be higher taxes or bigger budget deficits.

And then again, interest payments, the fastest growing government expenditure item, would grow even faster. Already, about 11 cents out of every rand goes into servicing public debt.

As the economy shrinks, more and more income would have to be spent on interest payments. Government’s ability to provide a social safety net in the form of social grants and other services, like education and health care, would be much more constrained. The service delivery protests that have become increasingly the norm would become even more widespread as the fiscus comes under serious strain.

Ultimately, the brigade of the unemployed would bear the brunt. Of course, the employed would also suffer because slow growth affects incomes.

Low and anaemic growth dries out consumer confidence. Job losses and subdued growth in incomes as a result of poor growth outcomes and prospects chips away at consumer confidence.

South Africa’s growth performance post 2008 has been very low. Over the past 10 years, the economy recorded an average of 2% growth per year. If this continues it will take more than 30 years to double average incomes in South Africa.

But if the country can increase growth to 5% as projected by the National Development Plan, it would take only 14 years to double average income. The higher the growth rate the shorter the time required to double incomes and bring people out of poverty.

[source from allAfrica]