Thursday August 11, 2011

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Jessica Hannah

Making headlines:

South Africa could shed nearly half a million jobs in the next 18 months, says JSE-listed Adcorp, as it reported a third consecutive month of job losses in July. This comes after South Africa's recent loss of almost a million jobs during the recent global recession, after which a slight upturn in employment numbers was detected. But Adcorp now expects a massive 468 192 jobs to be lost in the remaining months of 2011 and into 2012.
The index shows that employment numbers during July slumped by 0.4%, a statistic equivalent to yearly losses of 270 504 permanent workers and 79 380 temporary workers.

South African business is engaging with government on climate change policy issues in preparation for the seventeenth conference of parties (COP 17), which will be held in Durban, in November and December.
Impala Platinum CEO David Brown, who is also the co-chairperson of a CEO forum that would support the South African government at COP 17, says that issues currently being considered are the climate change and the carbon tax discussion papers. Brown says these are the two pieces of policy that need to be vigorously engaged on with government to ensure that whatever policy is adopted does not have unintended consequences.

Business Unity South Africa (Busa) VP Brenda Madumise has urged more South African companies to become active in the Indian market. Speaking in Sandton yesterday, she pointed out that some 102 Indian companies were now active in the South African market, but that significantly fewer South African businesses were operating in India.
She asks that companies start to move to do business in India in large numbers. In 2009, bilateral trade between the two countries stood at $7.33-billion; today, it’s worth $10-billion and is on track to reach $15-billion annually in 2015. Busa and the Confederation of Indian Industry have been working closely to enhance the business relationship between the two countries. Successive South African governments since 1994 have prioritised relations with India.

Also making headlines:
Fixed capital formation in South Africa – which is crucial to the country's economic growth – has been hit by the climate of uncertainty stemming from global financial turmoil, says the Reserve Bank.
The National Archives are ill-equipped to deal with the deluge of declassified information likely to ensue once the Protection of Information Bill becomes law, the Nelson Mandela Foundation warned.

And, the UN special envoy for the African nation saysSomalia's Islamist militants who fled the capital this week may regroup and resort to "terrorist tactics" but they have been severely weakened.

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today