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Other service activitiesSouth Africa

A colleague recently pointed out that First National Bank’s registration number shows that it was registered in 1929 (as Barclays South Africa), just as the world entered the great depression....

Madagascar

Madagascar is endowed with a wealth of natural resources. These include semi-precious stones, graphite, chromite, coal, bauxite, rare earth elements, salt, quartz, tar sand and mica. The country supplies around 80% of the world’s vanilla. Other main agricultural products include coffee, sugarcane, palm oil, cloves, cocoa, rice, cassava, beans, bananas and peanuts. The island nation also derives revenue from fishing, forestry and hydropower. Renowned for its biodiversity and its unique flora and fauna, Madagascar is often described the ‘Galapagos of the African continent’.

Eswatini

Eswatini is a landlocked country bordering South Africa and Mozambique, with a population of approximately 1.4 million. The country was renamed in 2018 by King Mswati III, who rules it as an absolute monarch. Eswatini has close economic ties to South Africa, which it depends on for about 85% of its imports and about 60% of exports. It is a member of the Common Monetary Area with Lesotho, Namibia, and South Africa, and its currency, the lilangeni is pegged at the rand, which is also used as legal tender.

Burundi

The Burundi economy ranks 41st on the continent with a GDP of US$3bn and a population of 11 million, and is classified as a ‘fragile’ economy which has been ravaged by a protracted civil war. According to the African Development Bank, economic growth is constrained by its unstable macroeconomic framework and security concerns, among other factors. Burundi, which is one of the world’s poorest nations, has been embroiled in a civil war for over a decade.

Accommodation and food service activitiesArts entertainment and recreation

Travel to Africa is expected to double by 2030. In the latest opinion piece by Who Owns Whom’s MD, Andrew McGregor looks at how, if South Africa is to grab...

FDI

South African imports from Africa have grown by a multiple of five to 12% of total imports since 1995 and its exports to the continent have almost doubled from 14% to 27% of total exports over the same period, positioning it second only to Asia as the major exporter to the continent.  As such it is interesting that Who Owns Whom has recently had a number of report requests on the food and beverage, telecoms and energy industries in Angola, Eswatini, Kenya, and Mozambique.

Malawi

Economic growth forecasts remain high for Malawi despite extreme poverty, food insecurity and recent protests over its May elections. President Peter Mutharika, voted in by a small margin in the election, which protesters across Lilongwe and Blantyre say was rigged, said in his state of the nation address that economic growth would reach 5% in 2019 on the back of higher agricultural production and growth in mining, ICT, and financial services.

Botswana

Botswana has a long-held reputation as a stand-out example of political and economic stability on the continent, which has seen its economy grow at an average of 5% over the past decade. Its reputation has begun to show cracks as former president Ian Khama and his chosen successor president Mokgweetsi Masisi lock horns in a battle which has implicated African Rainbow Minerals executive chairman Patrice Motsepe and his sister Bridgette Radebe, executive chairperson of Mmakau Mining.