© 2016 South Africa - The Good News
HOW SOUTH AFRICA CAME ROARING BACK IN DAVOS, AT “THE TURNING OF THE TIDE”
After the complete despair of SONA, the heartfelt emotion of Joost’s Loftus Versfeld Memorial Service and the gloom and doom of the Sunday papers – in 48 hours – I had difficulty dealing with my vacillating, schizophrenic, yo-yoing patriotism. I sat in bellicose despair as every parliamentarian attending SONA behaved appallingly; I sat with tear-filled emotion as every spokesperson at Joost’s memorial service showed the utmost dignity (some attended both). How will I ever forget Stephan’s stand-in rendition of the National Anthem (the official singers were late) or Amor’s extraordinarily sensitive eulogy, not to mention the genuine sincerity of all the speakers.
Sunday found me in a perplexed dwaal
Monday morning I found this in my in-box – it is a good news read!
Steuart Pennington
By Rowan Philp, for Sable (South African Business Link to Experts)
After one of its gloomiest years, optimism for South Africa’s future is suddenly roaring back.
Adding to a slew of other positive indicators ranging from SME confidence and Rand strength to new rainfall and the governance shake-up from the August municipal elections, veteran observers of the World Economic Forum report that “Team South Africa” had one of its best ever showings at the iconic Davos event last month.
...[read more]
Who said “I no understand”? Trump, Zuma, May, Le Pen??
by Cees Bruggemans
It isn’t an easy proposition. But the thing that Zuma & Trump have in common is that they don’t understand certain issues AND are willing to incur penalties for the broader population, provided their own mission definition wins through.
This rationale removes us from a modern democratic setting, regressing into the distant past how things were done. With loss of efficiency and net income gains. We are clearly getting off the path of decades, and enter an uncertain era in which we apparently welcome regression into past less efficient development paths, eroding our future real income & wealth gains.
Modern free trade concerns labour specialization, creating win-win situations between regions or countries where both sides gain. Except, that the allocation of free trade gains among populations is not uniform. There are winners who tend to be big, while there are also many losers. It is the allocation ruling free trade benefits that became too narrow, creating too many losers.
What is left are large swaths of population who lost out on globalisation. If those outsiders are not in some way compensated, they fall prey to populist politicians.
...[read more]
NATION BUILDER TALK CATALYSES THE LAUNCH OF A CULINARY DREAM
- Big solutions in small beginnings -
Andries Ngobeni (18 – on the right) dreams of being a chef. As the head of a child-led household, before becoming part of the Vastfontein Community Transformation family, this dream seemed unreachable. Until an idea that was sparked during the Nation Builder conference in 2016 helped to launch his growing business.
At this conference GG Alcock, CEO of Minanawe, explored the principles of KasiNomics and how many business opportunities are available within this economy. In the audience, GG’s words brought a flash of inspiration to Vastfontein Community Transformation CEO, Mathilda Fourie. She realised that this informal economy was the key to launching Andries’s culinary dream.
“I spend time with all the teenagers in our orphan care homes to do career pathing with them,” says Mathilda. “Andries told me that he dreams of becoming a chef. My initial thoughts were that there was no way, since it is very expensive to study formally to become a chef.”
...[read more]
THIS WEEK'S FAST FACT
Sweat it:
According to The Economist, South Africa has the highest fitness club revenue in the world with an estimated yearly revenue of $931 million. According to AMPS 2.7 million South African adults attend the gym at least once a week and a further 1.5 million attend the gym at least once a month.
(http://bit.ly/2kpbRXx, AMPS2015B)
Source: www.eighty20.co.za
