What positive things
happened during June?

JUNE ‘NUTSHELL’ NEWSLETTER

…… positive stories from June

“Positive stuff happens, you just have to look for it” was something my Latin teacher said when I was despairing at my complete inability to get anything right. I sometimes feel the same way when I read our daily newspapers and listen to and watch the news. It’s quite hard not to get buried.

But good stuff does happen. Going forward I’m going to set myself a target of summarizing 10 or so positive developments each month which I hope you the reader will enjoy and put into your ammo pouch for the next braai/dinner party.

by Steuart Pennington

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Are you one of six humans?

It’s in our Hands

By Justin Foxton

This monthly feature was conceived as our response to the President’s invitation: “Thuma Mina – Send Me”. It is a toolkit of easy ideas to help our readers respond to that call. However, given the fact that we are an apolitical publication – and the ANC has decided to use Thuma Mina as part of their 2019 election campaign – we have decided to change the name of this piece. It will now be called: “It’s in our Hands”. Here is why…

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Startup bootcamps
– where it is happening

Top 22 Startups Chosen for Final Selection Days – Startupbootcamp Africa

Startupbootcamp (SBC) Africa is the Africa-leg of a global family of industry-focused accelerators. This year is the second consecutive year that the programme will take place in Cape Town, and over the past 3 months the SBC team have criss-crossed the globe in search of the very best in tech talent. After receiving 1,004 applications from all over the world, the SBC team in conjunction with the programme’s corporate sponsors have narrowed the applicants down to 22 top-tier tech startups that will be invited to the Final Selection Days on July 11th and 12that PwC’s headquarters in Cape Town.

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THIS WEEK'S FAST FACT

Fast Fact: 6 Positive ways in which SA has developed over the last 15 years

Every year Stats SA releases its General Household Survey (GHS). The survey is conducted in the preceding year from January through to December.

The survey has been conducted since 2002.

1) Education

The percentage of people with no formal schooling has dropped by 6.7 percentage points nationally between 2002 and 2017.

2) Literacy

Nationally, the literacy rates of people over the age of 20 have consistently remained over 90% between 2002 and 2017 and even increased from 91.9% in 2002 to 94.3% in 2017. 

The highest literacy percentages were observed in the Western Cape (98.1%), Gauteng (97.8%) and the Free State (94.2%). The metropolitan areas of the City of Cape Town, Nelson Mandela Bay and the City of Johannesburg all saw a literacy rate of 99%.

3) Health

The overwhelming majority of South Africans reported their health as being good or better. Of those surveyed, 39.9% reported their health as being good, 21.5% reported their health as being very good and 30.9% reported their health as being excellent.

4) Electricity

The percentage of households connected to electricity mains has increased from 76.7% in 2002 to 84.4% in 2017. The Eastern Cape made the biggest jump of all provinces by increasing from only 55.3% in 2002 to 85.4% of households in 2017.

5) Sanitation

The number of households with access to improved sanitation saw a massive growth of 20.5 percentage points between 2002 and 2017. The percentage of households with no toilet also decreased from 12.6% in 2002 to 3.1% in 2017.

6. Access to food

The percentage of households who were vulnerable to hunger has decreased from 24.2% to 10.4% over the 15-year period.

Written by: Landi Groenewald

Source LEAD SA. For more info, visit Stats SA.

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