March 2010

The question everyone is asking is how the South African construction industry is likely to fare beyond 2010? Will government stick to its promise that over the next three years, it will spend R846-billion on infrastructure? Talk around the industry is that government needs to think counter-cyclically to get the best value for its infrastructure spend. In other words, while competition in the local construction industry is depressing profit margins, government has to award as many contracts as possible - fairly and without prejudice. Makes one think, doesn't it?

Another issue close to Modern Quarrying's heart is the negativity found from some of the smaller operations towards the Aspasa audits. In some cases, it was felt that while these quarries had achieved a fairly high percentage in terms of the Presidential Audit, they felt almost discriminated against by the Aspasa one.
One of the smaller quarry owners felt that it was a major effort to prepare for this audit, which he said, "wasn't worth an Eagle!" Another comment was that the smaller operator didn't have the benefit of a huge department to handle these matters.
What is important here is that the Aspasa audits have been developed by the industry, for the industry, to assist all operations both large and small, in getting their house in order in terms of the legal requirements.
MQ will be taking this up in a later issue. Please feel free to contact the editor directly should you have something you'd like to add in this regard.
dalek@crown.co.za

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