Page 5 - AfrElec Week 38 2022

AfrElec ESKOM AfrElec

Resolving Eskom crisis vital

for South African economy

- Ramaphosa

SOUTH AFRICA South Africa has endured a record six days of raised more than 90% of that amount in commit-
6,000MW power cuts, known locally as “stage 6” ments from both domestic and foreign investors.
load-shedding, and a total of 106 days of outages Of these commitments around ZAR 330bn has
so far this year, Bloomberg reports. already flowed into the economy, opening new
President Cyril Ramaphosa said in his weekly factories, expanding production lines, and cre-
letter to the nation that he had held an urgent ating new jobs.”
virtual meeting with ministers and officials on Having just concluded his visit to Washing-
Sunday (September 18) to discuss necessary ton, DC where he met with President Joe Biden,
steps to reduce the severity and frequency of load Ramaphosa highlited issues discussed during
shedding in the coming days and weeks. meetings, including peace and security, climate
“Eskom has already announced some of the change and food security.
measures it is taking, and we will remain seized “Most importantly, we discussed ways to
with this issue until the situation is resolved,” deepen trade and investment between our two
Ramaphosa said, without detailing any extra countries,” he said.
steps his government is prepared to take to prop In his letter, Ramaphosa said that the United
up the electricity grid. States is South Africa’s third-largest trading part-
“The severe load-shedding of the last few days ner and is the second-largest destination of the
has reminded us how unstable our ageing power country’s exports, behind China and the Euro-
stations are. It has given greater urgency to the pean Union.
measures we announced two months ago to sta- There are around 600 US companies in South
bilise our electricity supply.” Africa, the letter says. Also, an increasing num-
In July, after South Africa suffered a bout of ber of South African companies from sectors as
stage 6 load-shedding, Ramaphopsa announced diverse as mining, energy, chemicals, banking,
a number of government interventions to try to health and wellness, and luxury goods have
stabilise electricity supply, including improv- expanded their footprint into the US.
ing plant performance, establishing a compet- “We agreed with President Biden that we must
itive electricity market, opening the way for do more to increase business between our two
private investment in new generation capacity countries and have set up a joint task force on
and increasing South Africa’s investment in trade and investment to provide focus and direc-
renewables. tion to our efforts,” Ramaphosa said.
“Solving the electricity crisis is necessary if The president said in the letter that the gov-
we are to realise the potential of our economy. ernment is working to make South Africa’s econ-
In 2018, we launched an ambitious investment omy more competitive, more efficient and more
drive to raise ZAR 1.2 trillion [about $70bn] in attractive to both international and local compa-
new investments over five years,” Ramaphosa nies, adding that “first and foremost, we have to
said. overcome the electricity crisis.”™
“To date, and with still a year to go, we have

Week 38 22•September•2022 www. NEWSBASE .com P5