Tag: sustainability

Imagine this: It’s 7:30 a.m. in Nairobi, and your phone buzzes with an alert from the treasury dashboard. Overnight, a sudden Foreign Exchange (FX) shock in East Africa has threatened to erode your continent-wide supply chain margins by 5 percent. Yet, your factory in Lagos has already executed an automated hedge that caps the risk at 1 percent.

The Middle East conflict continues to destabilise an already volatile global economy. It is driving energy price shocks, inflationary pressure and heightened uncertainty for developing economies, particularly those exposed to energy and currency volatility. In South Africa, economic shockwaves continue to drive up fuel prices, strain energy systems and push the cost of living beyond reach.

Across Africa’s food and feed processing sectors, sustainability is increasingly moving to the centre of operational decision-making. Importantly, this shift is not being driven by environmental commitments alone. Instead, many businesses are driving it through more immediate priorities. These priorities include operational efficiency, profitability, resilience and long-term competitiveness.

South Africa’s office sector has started 2026 on a strong footing. According to the Rode Report for Q4 2025, published by Galetti Corporate Real Estate, the country’s national decentralised office vacancy rate fell year-on-year from 12.5% to 11.7%. Meanwhile, Grade-A office rentals increased by 3.5%. Total rental growth for 2025 averaged around 4%.

Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) discussions in South African boards generally default to carbon, community impact and governance process. While those remain essential, they do not tell the full story of organisational sustainability. A business may define sustainability narrowly. However, it still fails if it cannot protect data and recover quickly from cyber disruption in a digital economy.

In South Africa’s water-scarce regions, one of the most effective ways to restore water is also one of the least visible: clearing invasive alien vegetation. In the Western Cape, where the threat of “Day Zero” once brought the province to the brink, communities are working on the ground to restore natural water systems by removing invasive plants that consume significantly more water than indigenous species.

While South Africa committed to significantly decarbonise its energy mix by 2030 in 2021, progress started slowly. However, momentum increased at the start of this year. Both President Ramaphosa’s State of the Nation Address and the recent National Budget placed strong emphasis on energy reform. At the same time, the Department of Electricity and Energy has announced a timeline for wholesale market phasing.

South Africa's economic recovery gained credible momentum in 2025. GDP recorded its fifth consecutive quarter of growth in Q4-2025. This pushed the annualised rate to 1.1% for 2025. The Government of National Unity's reform agenda supported this growth. The end of load shedding also contributed. In addition, recovering consumer and business confidence strengthened the outlook.

South Africa is running out of landfill space fast. Major hubs like Cape Town and Johannesburg have less than five years of remaining landfill capacity. Therefore, the linear disposal method of landfilling is not serving the country’s waste management challenges. In addition to the landfill airspace challenge, organic waste carries an estimated R8.7 billion annual cost on our economy. This cost results from landfill practices.

As the global energy community gathers under the theme “Stronger Together” at this year’s Mining Indaba, the conversation about collaboration has never been more relevant. Supply chain volatility shapes the current environment. Rising operational costs add pressure. In addition, companies face increasing demands to improve productivity. As a result, energy businesses must rethink how they operate.