Editor’s take: Heading towards the world’s number one city – Cape Town.

As the mining industry and its related sectors gear up to attend the African Mining Indaba, the good news is that Time Out has voted Cape Town as the best city in the world for 2025, beating Bangkok, Thailand (in second place), New York, USA (third), Melbourne, Australia (fourth) and London, England (fifth). The British-based publication’s survey took into account aspects including food, nightlife and culture, affordability, happiness and overall city vibe. A contingent of more than 7000 visitors, both local and international, are expected to attend the Mining Indaba taking place from 3-6 February at the Cape Town International Convention Centre. It is a premier mining event dedicated to fostering successful capitalisation and development of mining interests in Africa.

Editor’s take: 2025 – another mettle testing year?

According to the Chinese calendar, 2025 is the Year of the Snake. Representing wisdom, elegance, and mystery, the snake is often seen as a symbol of transformation and adaptability. And with so many challenges presented to us on both the global and local fronts, the need for flexibility seems to be a given going into 2025.

Interestingly financial services provider, Deutsche Bank, in its Outlook 2025: Deeply invested growth, echoes this sentiment, stating that we live in a world characterised by rapid and accelerating change: economic, social, political and technological. “Change, in all its forms, is often unsettling but cannot be ignored. It will create challenges in 2025 and beyond, but also investment opportunities.” 

Editor’s take: Welcome December, welcome holidays.

2024 has been an eventful year. It has delivered many ‘shocks’, from the ANC losing its parliamentary majority to the formation of the GNU, Donald Trump taking office for a second term and snow in the Saudi Arabia desert – the first snowfall ever recorded in the Al-Jawf region in the northern Al-Nafūd desert. For Mzanzi, 2024 has been a challenging year with non-stop retrenchments, countless business closures and ends-not-meeting for most households. As we wrap up this year, South Africa’s mining industry, which contributes 7.53% to GDP, saw the majority of its commodities, barring gold, under pressure, leading to a drop in both revenue and profits.

Editor’s take: Business and Government Partnership Phase 2 – light at the end of the tunnel?

The optimistic sentiment following the launch of Phase 2 of Business and Government Partnership by President Cyril Ramaphosa earlier this month, was carried through to the 12th edition of Joburg Indaba, with participants and speakers alike buoyed and amped to move the dial to action. Phase 2 follows on the successful implementation of Phase 1, which was launched in 2023, where organised business (comprising about 150 CEOs) pledged its support to the government, offering expertise and capital to help fix the country’s problems in three key areas: electricity, transport and logistics, and crime and corruption.  Phase 2 of the government and business partnership, which chases stretch goals for 3% GDP growth, aims to enhance long-term energy security by maintaining an energy availability factor above 64%, unlocking R23 billion in private investment, boosting renewable capacity to 4GW, and constructing 1 000 km of new transmission lines as well as adding a million new jobs to the economy through growth by 2025.

Editor’s take: It seems that the tide, under the Government of National unity (GNU), is turning with government making a concerted effort to deal with aspects hindering economic growth, namely power and corruption, amongst others. In fact, speaking at the 22nd Africa Down Under mining and exploration conference in Perth, Australia, recently, Mzila Mthenjane, CEO of the Minerals Council South Africa, flagged the positives taking place in the country, such as the inclusion of the private sector to assist the government to stabilise and restore electricity generation and state-owned transport logistics services to nameplate capacities, and to tackle crime and corruption. “As the South African mining industry, we are gearing for growth. We will continue to capitalise on the positive post-election sentiment as we see accelerating structural reforms and growing private sector participation in key areas that impact the economy…,” he said.