opportunities

The International Finance Corporation has taken up a 10% stake in Johannesburg-based Wizzit Bank, which enables its customers to operate bank accounts using cellular phones, extending banking services to low-income earners and customers in rural areas.

  Dantjie Jagman, one of the collective of farm labourers who own New Beginnings Wine Farm near Paarl in the Western Cape. The workers were given...

Bilateral trade between South Africa and India has the potential to treble over the next five years with huge opportunities opening up for the business sectors.

The recent visit by a high-level South African business delegation to India has helped to strengthen economic relations between the two countries and exposed companies to the opportunities for trade and investment in South Africa.

A four-star hotel has opened at Freedom Square in Kliptown, giving tourists the option of luxury hotel accommodation in South Africa's famous township for the first time.

China's largest bank, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, has purchased a 20% stake in South Africa's Standard Bank for US$5.5-billion, representing the largest foreign direct investment in the country to date.

South Africa has indefinitely suspended the fishing of abalone - commonly known as perlemoen - in its waters, effective from 1 February 2008, as environmental authorities take drastic measures to protect the shellfish species from commercial extinction as a result of poaching and habitat destruction.

A number of top South African companies form part of a trade and investment mission to New Delhi and Mumbai in India this week.

The delegation is being led by Dr Essop Pahad, the Minister in the Office of the Presidency and is jointly organised by the Department of Trade and Industry (dti) and the International Marketing Council of South Africa (IMC).

South African petrochemicals company Sasol has opened an office in the Chinese city of Shanghai in order to market its diverse range of chemical solvents in the world's fastest growing major economy.

South Africa has launched a campaign to help local researchers, artists and inventors to patent ideas and findings that could be turned into viable business opportunities.

South Africa secured a Rugby World Cup quarterfinal place with a 30-25 win over Tonga in Lens on Saturday. A second-string starting 15 failed to produce the goods, prompting Springbok coach Jake White to insert his all-star substitutes' bench early in the second half.