The South African Reserve Bank’s latest Monetary Policy Review, published in early June, has left us in little doubt about the perilous state of the economy and that many of its current problems are self-induced.

While there has been some improvement in global conditions, domestic developments are having a negative effect on the economic landscape, especially widespread labour-market strife, which has “undermined confidence, investment and output”.

“Weak export demand, lower terms of trade and sustained domestic spending have further led to a widening current-account deficit on the balance of payments and contributed to credit-ratings downgrades. These domestic economic developments became the dominant drivers of the depreciating trend in the exchange value of the rand, in turn helping to support domestic inflation running against the global trend,” the review laments.

It is against this distressing backdrop that we publish the 2013 edition of the Real Economy Year Book – a publication that seeks to offer a fact-based snapshot of developments in selected industrial and mining sectors.

This edition evaluates the performance and outlook for a variety of sectors, including automotive, construction, electricity, road and rail, steel, water, coal, gold, iron-ore and platinum.

The Real Economy Year Book has also been divided into individual reports under the aforementioned sectors under the banner Real Economy Insight. They are available on Creamer Media’s Research Channel Africa website and Creamer Media’s store.

To purchase a copy of the report, click here.