{"id":707438,"date":"2023-07-28T07:40:00","date_gmt":"2023-07-28T05:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=707438"},"modified":"2023-07-28T08:04:08","modified_gmt":"2023-07-28T06:04:08","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1578","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/707438\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1578\/","title":{"rendered":"5 important things happening in South Africa today"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Here\u2019s what is happening in and affecting South Africa today:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Debt crisis ahead:<\/strong>\u00a0Research by the Wits Public Economy Project (PEP) forecasts that South Africa&#8217;s public debt will rise towards 80% by 2025 due to an increase in money spent on wages, grants and revising existing debt. This implies larger spending cuts and\/or higher taxes, which will further deteriorate economic growth and service delivery. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/opinion\/2023-07-28-daan-steenkamp-excessive-public-sector-wage-growth-is-the-problem-not-too-large-a-bureaucracy\/\" target=\"_blank\">Business Day<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Eskom&#8217;s unbundling delay:<\/strong> Eskom has failed to convince the&nbsp;National Energy Regulator of South Africa&nbsp;(Nersa) to expedite the process of granting the National Transmission Company of South Africa a licence to operate. This means the utility will likely miss its deadline to have a transmission company operating by December, ultimately delaying a competitive energy generation sector in the country. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/mg.co.za\/business\/2023-07-27-eskoms-unbundling-delayed-as-energy-regulator-stalls-on-licence-for-transmission-company\/\" target=\"_blank\">Mail &amp; Guardian<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Treasury prepares for worst-case scenario<\/strong>: Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana has said the National Treasury is considering the potential loss of benefits and the risk of secondary sanctions if South Africa is ousted from the AGOA trade agreement as a result of its ties with Russia. Godongwana added that this type of consideration will take some time, but expected stresses include higher inflation rates, borrowing costs, and bond yields \u2013 all of which weaken the fiscal position considerably. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.news24.com\/news24\/politics\/parliament\/national-treasury-considering-agoa-losses-and-risk-of-secondary-us-sanctions-enoch-godongwana-20230728\" target=\"_blank\">News24<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Eskom&#8217;s diesel issue:<\/strong> Eskom has already burnt through R12.4 billion on diesel to run its emergency generation fleet in just under the first four months into the current financial year ending 1 March 2024. It took eight months for Eskom to\u00a0spend R12-billion on diesel\u00a0last year, meaning the utility is on track to run out of funds for its OCGTs &#8211; which could result in record stages of load shedding towards the end of the year. Eskom&#8217;s diesel budget for the year is R27.9 billion. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymaverick.co.za\/article\/2023-07-27-billions-blown-as-eskom-burns-through-its-emergency-use-diesel\/\" target=\"_blank\">Daily Maverick<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Markets<\/strong>: The rand made strong gains on Thursday, bolstered by bets that the US Federal Reserve has reached the end of its interest rate hikes. \u201cWe\u2019ve likely arrived at peak rates in the US,\u201d said Nolan Wapenaar, co-chief investment officer at South African asset manager Anchor Capital. On Friday (28 July), the rand was trading at R17.85\/$, R19.58\/\u20ac, and R22.82\/\u00a3. Brent crude is trading at $83.75 a barrel. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.moneyweb.co.za\/news\/markets\/rand-steady-after-fed\/\" target=\"_blank\">MoneyWeb<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>South Africa&#8217;s public debt is forecasted to get worse; Eskom&#8217;s plans for a National Transmission Company hits a road block; Treasury is preparing for South Africa to be ousted from the AGOA; and Eskom is burning through its diesel budget.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":660715,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[26,853],"class_list":["post-707438","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-headline","tag-south-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707438","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=707438"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707438\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":707474,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707438\/revisions\/707474"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/660715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=707438"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=707438"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=707438"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}