South Africa commemorates National Disability Rights Awareness Month from 3 November to 3 December annually, with National Disability Rights Awareness Day celebrated on 3 December. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), disability refers to impairments, activity limitations, and participation restrictions. An impairment may be physical, cognitive, mental, sensory, emotional or developmental and may be   read more »

After recording two consecutive quarters of negative gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the first and second quarter of 2018, South Africa’s economy has slipped into a technical recession. One of the negative contributors to the GDP growth was transport, contributing -4,9 percentage points. However, there is still hope for the industry, especially since October   read more »

September is Albinism Awareness Month. During this month, the Department of Health provides information on albinism to make people more aware of what this condition entails and to highlight myths and superstitions regarding people with albinism. Albinism is an inherited condition where a person is unable to produce normal colouring of the skin (lack of   read more »

August is known to South Africans as Women’s Month as the country commemorates and pays tribute to the more than 20 000 women who marched to the Union Buildings on 9 August 1956 in protest against the extension of Pass Laws to women. The government of South Africa declared August as Women’s Month and 9   read more »

This year, 2018, marks the centenary (the 100-year anniversary) of the birth of former South African president Nelson Mandela, as well as Albertina Sisulu. This provides a unique opportunity for people around the world to reflect on Mandela’s life and times, and to promote his legacy. The Reserve Bank of South Africa has taken this   read more »

The South African Reserve Bank (SARB) will be launching its first commemorative Nelson Mandela banknote series in celebration of the first democratically elected president’s birth centenary. These notes will be issued into circulation by 18 July 2018 and will cover all denominations of R10, R20, R50, R100 and R200. As part of the celebrations, the   read more »

From 7 to 10 May 2018, the South African tourism industry hosted the annual Africa’s Travel Indaba at the Inkosi Albert Luthuli Convention Centre in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal. This is one of the largest tourism marketing events on the African calendar and the tourism industry as it showcases the variety of Africa’s best tourism products, attractions   read more »

On 2 April 2018, South Africa and the world at large received news of the passing of Winnie Madikizela-Mandela. She passed away at the age of 81 after a long illness. Dubbed ‘Mother of the Nation’, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela became a potent symbol of South Africa’s anti-apartheid struggle when she was banished and jailed for campaigning   read more »

South Africa will host 10th Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) Summit which is scheduled from 25 to 27 July 2018. The 2018 Summit will be an important milestone for BRICS cooperation, as it represents a decade of BRICS cooperation at the highest diplomatic level. The summit will see South Africa building on   read more »

As we were approaching the end of 2017, the Minister in the Presidency for Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation, Mr Jeff Radebe, announced the appointment of the new Statistician-General (SG) for Statistics South Africa (Stats SA), Mr Risenga Maluleke, on 20 October 2017. The appointment followed the retirement of Dr Pali Lehohla who served as SG   read more »