Mbalo Brief – June 2018
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 »
Stats SA to ensure VAT change reflected in
MEDIA RELEASE 19 March 2018 Stats SA to ensure VAT change reflected in CPI The VAT increase to 15% on 1 April will affect the price of many of the items in the Consumer price index (CPI) basket. Retailers and service providers may adopt different approaches and timeframes to pass this increase onto their customers. read more »
Counting the costs of Valentine’s Day
You’ve got no one to blame except yourself. Admit it. You totally forgot about Valentine’s Day. Now that it’s just around the corner you’ve got to come up with something fast! It was months ago when you and your significant other agreed that it would be your turn this year to do something special. You read more »
Jump in government higher education spending
It’s been three years since the #FeesMustFall campaign erupted on campuses across the country. Thousands of students protested – at times violently – over rising tuition fees. On the back of frustration over the lack of funding for poorer students, the movement resuscitated, in a big way, the debate over whether South Africa should offer read more »
Agriculture and finance help lift SA out of recession
After two consecutive quarters of decline, the South African economy spluttered back to life in the second quarter of 2017. Positive contributions to higher economic activity across most industries – in particular agriculture, finance and mining – lifted the gross domestic product (GDP) by 2,5% quarter-on-quarter (seasonally adjusted and annualised). Agriculture continued to show strong read more »
Stats Biz – August 2017
South African households spend more on beer than they do on vegetables, according to data from the Consumer Price Index (CPI) release. Beer accounts for 2,1% of total household spending, higher than the 1,5% that is spent on vegetables. How does spending on beer compare to other products such as tobacco and sweets? Explore household read more »
Beer more popular than vegetables
Beer more popular than vegetables Nqa, Impilo, Pholo e ntle, gesondheid, Awe, Cheers! Many of us enjoy a pint, but have you ever really thought much about the industry and what you spend on your beer? In celebration of International Beer Day, we take a closer look at how much households spend on beer and read more »
Mbalo Brief- May 2017
Temperatures across the country have begun to drop; this tells us that winter is here. As a result, many households and companies are starting to use electrical appliances to keep the cold away. This usually results in higher electricity bills. One of the ways in which consumers can cut high electricity costs is through house read more »
A tale of three economies in Africa
One of many comparisons between countries is the size of their economies. In the recent past, a number of people noted that Nigeria had overtaken South Africa as the largest economy on the African continent. Subsequently, articles were written about South Africa being pushed into third place by Egypt, only to regain the silver medal read more »
Stats Biz – January 2017
When last did you copy data onto a blank CD? With the rise of USB sticks and cloud storage, gone are the days of backing up your data on a compact disk. It comes as no surprise then, that Stats SA removed blank CDs and DVDs from the latest version of the Consumer Price Index read more »