Janet Wilhelm
TIPS Webinar - Unravelling South Africa's Just Transition: Unpacking the ground-level impacts in the coal value chain
Muhammed Patel - TIPS
Report: Sector Jobs Resilience Plan: Coal value chain
Pulane Mafoea Nkalai - Sam Tambani Research Institute
Presentation: Energy Mix choices and the protection of workers’ interests in South Africa
Michelle Cruywagen, Megan Davies and Mark Swilling - Centre for Complex Systems in Transition, Stellenbosch University
David Hallowes - groundWork
Presentation: Down to Zero
Report: Down to Zero - The politics of just transition (David Hallowes and Victor Munnik 2019)
Gemma Gatticchi, Bloomberg. 4 November 2020: Renewable energy drive threatens 120,000 South African jobs
Pulane Mafoea Nkalai is a Senior Researcher at the Sam Tambani Research Institute (SATRI), the research arm of the National Union of Mine Workers (NUM). She has conducted extensive research on the welfare of workers and workers communities especially in the mining, energy and construction sectors of Southern Africa. Pulane will present on Energy mix choices and the protection of workers’ interests in South Africa.
About the Facilitator
Background
South Africa, a carbon-intensive economy, has initiated a transition to a more sustainable development pathway. While this is an economy-wide transformation, the progressive decline of the coal value chain is at the centre of this shift. In a highly unequal society like South Africa, the need for a just transition, which would empower vulnerable stakeholders, has emerged as an imperative. Beyond the stakeholders who rely on it for their livelihood, the coal value chain plays a singular role in the South African economy, society, politics and psyche. As such, the transition in South Africa’s coal value chain has the potential to influence the country’s entire socio-economic trajectory. This dialogue aims to inform this just transition process. It explores the ground-level impacts associated with a just transition away from coal.
This webinar builds on a two earlier dialogues, hosted on 7 July and 29 September.
FDI Tracker Q1 and Q2 2020
This report presents investment projects captured in Q1 and Q2 of 2020. Q1 and Q2 have been combined mainly because of the low number of investment projects announced in Q1 2020, combined with general delays in the release of certain data, such as those which inform the investment environment analysis. This was anticipated when investment globally was impacted by the slowdown in economic activity as strict measures were implemented in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 35 projects were recorded over the two quarters, with 27 projects identified in Q1, and eight projects in Q2. Over half the number of investments captured over the two quarters were by three companies. The total pledged investment value is R43.8 billion from 30 projects. Tracking further captured 3 320 job opportunities from eight projects, seven of which are by one company representing 3 300 jobs. These jobs are likely a mix of permanent and temporary opportunities as the company did not explicitly distinguish jobs by this segmentation. In this period seven projects were upgraded.
The forestry value chain faces many challenges. These include rising costs for transportation, labour, raw material inputs, energy and imported raw materials, exacerbated by poor road infrastructure that contributes to high maintenance costs and inefficiencies. Increasingly, climate change is an additional stressor that demands transitioning from business-as-usual practices. There is a close link between climate change and the forestry value chain. On the one hand, forests are affected by climate change physically through higher mean annual temperatures, changing precipitation patterns and more frequent and extreme weather events, and also economically through climate change related policy measures. On the other hand, forests help to mitigate climate change through sequestrating carbon if the forests are sustainably managed, but with land-use conversion and forest degradation, can contribute to climate change through more carbon emissions. Climate change thus represents both a challenge and an opportunity. As such, a proactive approach is required to harness the profitability associated with embracing sustainability.
While climate change impacts have been assessed for various ecosystems across the world, the risk to industrial forestry plantations in South Africa is not yet well understood. The objectives of this report are to identify and explore the climate-compatibility in South Africa’s forestry value chain; and to suggest solutions to address the climate-compatibility problems in South Africa’s forestry value chain.
South Africa in a low-carbon world: Trade green or trade not
Daily Maverick - 29 September 2020 by Gaylor Montmasson-Clair
Read online at Daily Maverick
Covid-19 grant is vital, SAA not so much
Business Day - 28 September 2020 by Neva Makgetla (TIPS Senior Economist)
Read online at Business Day.
RESPONSE TO COLUMN
Letter in Business Day - 30 September 2020
Read online at Business Day.
Carbon tariffs pose threat to SA’s export competitiveness
Export Tracker - Q2 2020
The second quarter of 2020 saw a strong decline in exports, combined with an even stronger slump in imports as international trade slowed down because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Several sectors, however, particularly agriculture and parts of mining, were able to increase exports over the quarter. Stringent COVID-19 containment measures implemented in most countries led to the plummeting of merchandise trade, with the “Great Lockdown” seeing South Africa through a five-week, hard nationwide lockdown in the second quarter of 2020. Exports dropped by 32.5% in US dollar terms, while imports plunged to US$14 billion in the second quarter of 2020, down by 39.2% from the same period last year. However, because of the depreciation of the rand, the decline in both exports and imports in rand terms was a little lower compared to the decline in dollar terms – with rand exports down by 17.6%, and imports by 25.9%.
Media Release: Growth in SA exports to China
TIPS Tracker: The economy and the pandemic
Read online at Engineering News.
This TIPS tracker highlights important trends in the COVID-19 pandemic in South Africa, and how they affect the economy. It analyses publically available data, research and media reports to identify current developments and reflect on the prognosis for the contagion, the economy, and policy responses.
Since the pandemic and the economy have stabilised, this will be the last Tracker. TIPS will continue to publish periodic in-depth analyses of developments and debates around recovery and reconstruction. Our quarterly Real Economy Bulletin will also include a section on the impact of the pandemic on the economy.
KEY FINDINGS FOR THE WEEK
On the pandemic
- The rate of transmission of COVID-19 has continued on a secular upward trend, but the increase has been both slow and unpredictable. The long holiday weekend around Heritage Day on 24 September appears to have fuelled an uptick a week later.
- The rate of transmission depends largely on the extent to which public health authorities are able to convince people to wear masks and avoid social gatherings, whether in homes or businesses.
- Overall, excess deaths during the COVID-19 pandemic seem likely to be the largest single source of natural deaths in South Africa this year. For comparison, COVID-19 is now estimated as the 12th largest cause of death globally, but ranks first in New York, Brazil and Peru, second in the UK, and third in Sweden.
On the economy
- In a pattern seen worldwide, the recovery has taken a “swoosh” shape, with a relatively sharp rebound in April and May fading into a more gradual improvement over the past four months. Breakdowns in Eskom plants remain a binding constraint, with a downturn in electricity sales in September.
- As usual with economic and natural disasters, damage from the pandemic is falling disproportionately on the poorest communities and households. Employment data for the second quarter show that job losses were highest for lower-skilled, lower-income and informal workers. These groups will also be hard hit by the termination of the COVID-19 special grant and the supplement to other social grants, currently due to end on 15 October.
Download the Tracker or read online