{"id":498099,"date":"2021-06-14T08:07:58","date_gmt":"2021-06-14T06:07:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=498099"},"modified":"2021-06-14T12:09:05","modified_gmt":"2021-06-14T10:09:05","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1059","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/498099\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1059\/","title":{"rendered":"5 important things happening in South Africa today"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Here&#8217;s what is happening in and affecting South Africa today:<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Coronavirus<\/strong>: In South Africa, there have been 7,657 new cases of Covid-19, taking the total reported to 1,747,082. Deaths have reached 57,731 (+78), while recoveries have climbed to 1,606,581\u00a0 leaving the country with a balance of 82,736 active cases. The total number of vaccines administered is 1,773,417 (+6,002).<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Lockdown:<\/strong> The National Coronavirus Command Council is reportedly to meet &#8216;soon&#8217;, with further lockdown restrictions said to be on the agenda, given the recent rise in Covid-19 cases in South Africa, putting the country into a third wave of infection. While medical and health experts are on board for tighter lockdown &#8211; asking for smaller gatherings and a longer curfew &#8211; not everyone is on board with it. The South African Council of Churches and the Gauteng Education Department have both spoken out against further restrictions , saying focus should be rather placed on problem areas. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.enca.com\/news\/sa-lockdown-some-against-tougher-restrictions\">ENCA<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Bright outlook<\/strong>: Some economists are taking a more optimistic outlook on South Africa&#8217;s economic prospects for this year and the future, saying that things are better than the doom and gloom view held by many. They say the country&#8217;s economy is recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic faster than expected, and even though unemployment remains at an all-time high, South Africa has managed to create many jobs for skilled professionals. All things considered, South Africa&#8217;s prospects look good, and things can only get better, they said &#8211; however, real growth requires government to come to the party with reforms to create an enabling environment. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.moneyweb.co.za\/news\/economy\/sa-has-extremely-bright-economic-prospects-economists\/\">Monewyweb<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Vaccines<\/strong>: Aspen pharmaceuticals has assured president Cyril Ramaphosa that it will increase capacity and ramp up production of the Johnson &amp; Johnson vaccine, after South Africa was forced to dump 2 million doses following contamination concerns. The US Food and Drug Administration on Friday ruled that a large number of Johnson &amp; Johnson vaccines coming out of its Baltimore plant were contaminated, which resulted in 60 million doses needing to be disposed of. The dump is a blow to South Africa&#8217;s vaccine rollout, which has already made slower progress than was hoped for. The J&amp;J doses are one-shot jabs, which government wants to use in more remote areas of South Africa. [<a href=\"https:\/\/ewn.co.za\/2021\/06\/14\/aspen-reassures-ramaphosa-it-is-ramping-up-production-of-j-and-j-covid-19-vaccine\">EWN<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Certified<\/strong>: Education experts say that government&#8217;s new grade 9 certificate may prove useful in gauging the level of performance for those learners &#8211; but the nature of the examinations the education department wants to set up will come at a huge monetary cost, which South Africa&#8217;s budget can&#8217;t take, especially when there are other areas in education that need to be focused on. This includes reading, writing and maths &#8211; things that learners are stumbling at as early as grade 3. Standardised exams at grade 9 level will create more work and more complexity &#8211; though the experts say it probably won&#8217;t incentivise learners to leave school either, as there is hardly any demand for grade 12 certificates in South Africa as is. [<a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeslive.co.za\/sunday-times-daily\/news\/2021-06-13-is-the-new-grade-nine-certificate-a-pass-or-a-fail-this-is-what-the-experts-say\/\">TimesLive<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Markets<\/strong>: Markets were lifted on Friday, off the back of US and European central bank data pointing to looser monetary policies for the time being, spurring positive sentiment. However, despite a small boost for the rand, riding that wave, the local unit ended the week slightly weaker against the dollar, down almost 2%. The rand has been enjoying a boost from a risk-on environment favouring emerging markets, and demand for commodities as industries crawl towards pre-Covid levels. On Monday the rand is at R13.74\/$, R16.62\/\u20ac and R19.38\/\u00a3.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The NCCC will meet &#8216;soon&#8217; to discuss possible tighter lockdown restrictions; some economists have a very bright outlook for South Africa; Aspen promises to ramp up vaccine production after J&#038;J doses are dumped; and experts weigh in on South Africa&#8217;s new grade 9 certificates.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":465686,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11121,23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-498099","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance","category-government","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498099","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=498099"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498099\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":498285,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498099\/revisions\/498285"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/465686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=498099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=498099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=498099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}