{"id":733041,"date":"2023-11-23T08:22:04","date_gmt":"2023-11-23T06:22:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=733041"},"modified":"2023-11-23T08:22:04","modified_gmt":"2023-11-23T06:22:04","slug":"5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1658","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/733041\/5-important-things-happening-in-south-africa-today-1658\/","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>Gross cost of port congestion:<\/strong>&nbsp;The South African Association of Freight Forwarders (SAAFF) estimates that the current congestion at South Africa\u2019s ports is costing at least R124 million a day in direct and indirect costs. The direct daily costs are R98 million, comprising both sunk costs and congestion surcharges. The indirect costs associated with impeding the movement of goods are valued at about R26 million. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.engineeringnews.co.za\/article\/saaff-warns-of-rising-port-congestion-costs-2023-11-22\" target=\"_blank\">Engineering News<\/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>Fraud hikes medical premiums:<\/strong>\u00a0Medical aid schemes are losing an estimated R30 billion annually due to fraud, waste and abuse of the system, the Healthcare Fraud, Waste and Abuse Indaba in Johannesburg heard on Wednesday.\u00a0Professor Thuli Madonsela said fraud contributes to the high cost of medical aid, making it challenging for people to afford medical aid. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.news24.com\/fin24\/companies\/medical-schemes-lose-r30-billion-a-year-to-fraud-conference-hears-20231122\" 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>Some good news:<\/strong>&nbsp;South Africa\u2019s tourism industry has rebounded to above pre-pandemic levels, with bookings in the first ten months of 2023 exceeding those in the same period in 2019.&nbsp;Data compiled by NightsBridge \u2013 a technology company that links accommodation establishments to the websites that sell their rooms \u2013 shows a clear upward trend, with total bookings from January to October 2023 exceeding those from the same period in 2019 by 7.4%. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/dailyinvestor.com\/south-africa\/38486\/tourism-booming-in-south-africa\/\" target=\"_blank\">Daily Investor<\/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>Woolies defends CEO pay:<\/strong>\u00a0Woolworths\u2019 board has defended the R122m total pay of CEO Roy Bagattini, saying it is in line with industry standards for similarly sized JSE companies, adding its executive pay was \u201cnot too high\u201d. Bagattini\u2019s 2023 salary was almost double that of the CEO of Shoprite group, Pieter Engelbrecht, who earned R64.6m in its 2023 financial year. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bd\/companies\/retail-and-consumer\/2023-11-23-woolworths-defends-executives-pay-as-remuneration-votes-fail\/\" 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>Markets:\u00a0<\/strong>The rand weakened against the U.S. dollar on Wednesday after higher-than-forecast inflation in October. Headline inflation\u00a0increased to 5.9% year-on-year in October from 5.4% in September. On Thursday (23 November), the rand was trading at R18.85 to the dollar, R23.57 to the pound and R20.55 to the euro. Oil is trading at $82.37 a barrel. [<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/markets\/south-african-rand-slips-ahead-local-inflation-data-2023-11-22\/\" target=\"_blank\">Reuters<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Port chaos costing hundreds of millions a day; medical fraud is hitting consumer pockets; tourism is booming; and Woolworths defends CEO&#8217;s R122 million payday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":732045,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[26,853],"class_list":["post-733041","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\/733041","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=733041"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733041\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":733069,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733041\/revisions\/733069"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/732045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=733041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=733041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=733041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}