Christo Says
[{“type”:”text”,”content”:”This statement comes from the state of the nation address (SONA) delivered by President Cyril Ramaphosa earlier this year. Agriculture especially is affected negatively by too many regulations. If this issue is not addressed, it will continue to have far-reaching implications for economic growth in South Africa. Drastic steps are required to free up the economy to overcome the devastating impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.nnThe Covid-19 pandemic affected South Africau2019s economic growth in the first quarter (Q1) of 2020 but had a far more severe impact during the level 5 lockdown in April 2020, which limited the countryu2019s economic activity. These economic disruptions saw a 17% year-on-year decline in the (GDP) in the second quarter (Q2) of 2020, followed by a 14% improvement in the third quarter (Q3).nnGDP growth reached 1% and 1,2% in the 2021-Q1 and 2021-Q2 respectively. As a result of this rebound, in the year to June 2021 the GDP grew at a faster rate than at any time since the early 2000s. Still, it remained 1,4% smaller than before the pandemic. The largest contributors to quarter-on-quarter growth in 2021 Q2 were transport, personal services, and trade industries. nnThe Covid-19 economic downturn also led to a contraction in the number of business establishments. According to the Small Enterprise Development Agencyu2019s (SEDA) SMME Quarterly Update (2021), the number of SMMEs in South Africa declined by 11% (289 000) year-on-year from the first quarter (Q1) of 2020 to the first quarter (Q1) of 2021, falling from 2,61 million to 2,33 million. nnThe impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and economic shutdowns resulted in significantly higher poverty in South Africa. According to the NIDS CRAM 5th Wave Research, in April/May 2021 approximately 10 million people and 3 million children were in a household affected by hunger.”,”position”:0,”id”:”Xn6FILtgI2T3WZin”}]