As we celebrate Women’s Month in August, the South African government has made headway to promote gender equality and empowerment of women and closing the gap by increasing the proportion of seats allocated to women in parliament. The promotion of gender equality and women empowerment are part of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which must be met by December 2015. However, gender-based discrimination is still rife with regard to women’s access to land and assets. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which is a cross-country measure of discrimination against women in social institutions across 160 countries; formal and informal laws, social norms and practices, the absence of a national communal land tenure laws still leave many women who live in the former ‘Bantustans’ or homelands vulnerable, as access to land strongly depends on relations to local power, which is usually vested in men. OECD ranked South Africa at position 90 out of 148 countries in social institutions and gender index.

Our educational article for this month’s issue of Mbalo Brief focuses on the change in the use of electricity amongst households in South Africa. The findings in this article are based on the General Household Survey (GHS) Series V: Energy, 2002–2012 (Report No. 03-18-04). The article provides an analysis of access to electricity and changes in the households’ use of electricity.

This issue also features articles on Land transport, Mining, Food and beverages and Tourism and Migration, amongst others. Fill in our crossword puzzle to test your insight into general issues. We have also included the solutions to the July 2015 puzzle.

Articles published in this issue are based on results of industry surveys conducted for the months ranging from April to July 2015, which were released in July and August 2015.

Download Mbalo Brief – August 2015

For full details on any of our surveys, visit our website at www.statssa.gov.za
Enjoy the read!