Vaccinate and Return to Play

Deputy President David Mabuza has called on all South African citizens to heed the call to vaccinate in order to reduce the rate of infections, hospitalisation and deaths.

Mabuza was speaking at the launch of the Vaccination Social Mobilisation campaign, in partnership with the Department of Sports, Arts and Culture under the theme ‘Return to Play – it’s in your hands’.

Mabuza said that they have partnered in their collective commitment to fight against the COVID-19 pandemic by reaching out to communities through this campaign.

“If we are to revive our vibrant creative industries, if we are to return to our theatres, stadiums to play and enjoy, it is important that our vaccination programme is accelerated to reach as many people as possible,” Mabuza said.

The Deputy President was flanked by Sports, Arts and Culture Minister, Nathi Mthethwa; Deputy Minister of Health, Dr Sibongiseni Dhlomo and Gauteng Premier David Makhura, among others.

Mabuza said government has no doubt that with the active participation of leaders and practitioners in the creative sectors and sport, the campaign will reach every village, suburb and every street corner to get South Africans vaccinated.

“As part of this social mobilisation programme, we must reach out to educate communities about the benefits of vaccines, and dispel myths and the spread of fake and untrue conspiracy theories about vaccines. In that way, we will ensure that we eliminate vaccine hesitancy and save more lives in the process.

“As a country, we must contribute to the global fight against COVID-19, and revive sport and the creative industries to contribute to economic recovery and reconstruction,” Mabuza said.

The Deputy President said the country’s response to containing the spread of COVID-19 infections necessitated the implementation of restrictions, which impacted on the economy as a whole, while ensuring lives are saved.

“The restrictions related to entertainment and sporting venues have made it difficult for some of our artists to sustain themselves. With limited fiscal resources from government, no amount of support could be enough to compensate for the negative impact of COVID-19 on sustainable incomes and livelihoods.

“While government made contributions to lessen the negative impact on incomes, we are under no illusion this dealt with all the problems that the creative sectors faced,” Mabuza said.

He commended the commitment and resilience of artists and the creative sector as a whole for supporting government efforts to contain the spread of COVID-19 and prevent the loss of lives.

Population immunity

The Deputy President said the path to saving lives and economic recovery depends on the accelerated roll-out of the vaccination programme to reach the required levels of population immunity.

“For those countries who have reached population immunity, including the United Kingdom and Germany, normalcy is returning as they are now able to attend the sporting and cultural events of their choice. In the process, there are positive impacts on their economies,” Mabuza said.

He said Africa has a long way to go to reach the levels of vaccination that allow it to follow suit.

“The social mobilisation campaign that we are launching today must assist us to ramp up our vaccination programme to reach a required target of herd immunity, so that we are able to open sport and entertainment venues.

“A vaccinated nation is what it will take to once again open the stadium for the popular Soweto Derby. A vaccinated nation is what it will take to open the Cape Town Jazz Festival, Macufe and other prominent music events on our calendar, and indeed, a vaccinated nation is what it will take to open the Durban July and other similar events,” Mabuza said.

Mabuza said government will continue to work with the scientific community and ensure that its decision-making processes are based on empirical science, which states clearly that vaccines save lives.

Reclaiming normalcy

Delivering his remarks, Dhlomo said the Department of Health is grateful to be part of the event, where leaders are making a commitment to join hands with government to save lives and livelihoods.

Dhlomo reiterated that it is clear vaccination is the only way to reclaim some form of normality to life.

The Deputy Minister said Gauteng is currently vaccinating 75 000 people a day and the province would like to push that number to 100 000 a day.

Meanwhile, Makhura announced that the Gauteng province is officially out of the third wave.

“We can only fully return to some new normality when we have vaccinated between 67% and 80% of our population. Vaccines are the most powerful game changer in our hands.

“This is a very empowering [campaign] theme, which calls on all of us to play our part. The theme emphasises the power of collective action and ability of people in every sector to take their destiny and future into their own hands,” Makhura said.

Source: South African Government News Agency

ZCZC

Finance

Inflation targeting benefitted economy, says Kganyago

Over the last 21 years of inflation targeting, the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) has largely succeeded in delivering on its objective, despite many challenges, says Governor Lesetja Kganyago.

Delivering a virtual keynote address on the country’s 21 years of inflation targeting, hosted by the University of Stellenbosch on Wednesday, Kganyago said lower inflation had generally benefitted the economy, including households of all income levels.

The public lecture coincides with the SARB’s 100 year anniversary and the rand turning 60 years old. This year also saw the commemoration of 25 years of central bank’s independence.

He said: “As lenders require less compensation for inflation, interest rates have come down. Furthermore, with expectations anchored inside the inflation target range, businesses no longer raise prices as soon as the exchange rate weakens. This credibility has helped us cut interest rates to record lows during the COVID-19 crisis – and we have been able to keep rates low during the recovery.

“This stands in stark contrast to some of our peers, where higher inflation has forced rate hikes, even though the pandemic is ongoing.”

Inflation targeting had asked a lot of the SARB and South Africans generally, “but not more than any of us could deliver”.

For a start, he said inflation targeting was more flexible than critics claim.

“It doesn’t require the central bank to cancel out every price shock using interest rates, or to have perfect forecasts. Shocks are inevitable, and so are forecast mistakes. What central banks need to do is convince people that they will do what it takes to steer inflation back to target, over a realistic timeframe.

“This is achievable and has repeatedly been achieved, with the key result that the expectations South Africans hold of future inflation have consistently been falling,” he said.

Similarly, said Kganyago, central banks have also tried targeting exchange rates – an objective that in many cases, including our own, has ended with billions of dollars thrown away for no tangible gain.

The country had avoided exchange rate adventurism throughout the inflation-targeting era, saying the policy had served South Africa well.

“The easiest way to destroy price stability in South Africa would be to insist on low interest rates because of unemployment. Our labour market is so dysfunctional, this excuse would rule out ever raising rates – a policy that would leave us in the worst case scenario of high unemployment and high inflation.”

This excuse, he said, “might have impressed people, and won us sympathy, but it would have been profoundly irresponsible”.

He said the country had not faced a tragic dilemma where there was no right answer – either jobs or inflation.

Responding adequately

“We have faced a necessary choice, to do the good we can do, understanding the limits of our powers. In making this choice, we have equipped ourselves to respond forcefully when there is a genuine cyclical downturn, beyond the structural labour market problems that have long blighted this economy.

While the COVID-19 pandemic had seen the country shed 1.5 million jobs, Kganyago said inflation was now back in the middle of the central bank’s target range, while interest rates were at record lows.

“If this were solely about inflation, we would have raised rates already. So never, let anyone tell you that the SARB only cares about inflation and ignores jobs. Rather, bear in mind that we have this power only because we put price stability first. We have anchored inflation expectations,” he said.

“We did not commit to an impossible mission.”

Since 2000, South Africa’s targeted-inflation had averaged 5.8%, which was within the 3–6% target range.

“It has been 4.5% over the past five years, exactly in the middle of our target range.

To some extent, the SARB’s success with inflation targeting also comes down to a fourth factor, which is good luck, he said.

“Unlike some other policy tasks, such as education, monetary policy can be delivered from a single head-office and maybe a few regional offices. Furthermore, thanks to factors such as our constitutional independence, we have been able to avoid State Capture, unlike many other organs of government,” Kganyago said.

He said this meant the central bank had remained focused on serving the public, instead of diverting resources to patronage networks.

“We must also acknowledge a helpful global environment. In pursuing low inflation, we have been able to draw on a wealth of global knowledge,” he said.

Source: South African Government News Agency

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