Tag Archives: Tito Mboweni

Corona Virus Lockdown: Restaurants encouraged to employ local rather than foreign staff!

 

In a speech last week our Finance Minister Tito Mboweni criticized local businesses for their high employment of foreign nationals in our country, Malawians and Zimbabweans in particular, and singled out the Restaurant industry in particular. In his address to the nation on Saturday, Minister of Industry and Trade Ebrahim Patel encouraged South Africans to Buy Local rather than imported goods, making absolute sense in both instances, in that our crippled economy needs our monetary reserves to stay in our country, and to be spent locally. Continue reading →

Franschhoek attracting most new restaurant openings, despite the state of the economy: December 2019!

 

The only new restaurants opening this month are Epice, in Franschhoek, headed by Chef Charné Sampson, belonging to The La Colombe Group, and to be located in the former Marigold restaurant, as well as The Four Square Club, opened as a lunch restaurant by Chef Chris Erasmus at Môreson. Chef Peter Tempelhoff announced the opening of a new ‘funky’ restaurant in Cape Town on Kfm last week. 

Other recent restaurant openings are Exhibit A of Chefs Rikku O’Donnchü and Warwick King on Bree Street in Cape Town, La Chêne was opened by Chef Darren Badenhorst at Leeu Estates in Franschhoek, and Cowboys & Cooks has opened in De Waterkant. Continue reading →

Cape Town and Winelands Restaurant Openings for rest of 2019/2020 summer dried up? Reflection of the economy?

With rating agencies giving our economy a thumbs down, and our Minister of Finance Tito Mboweni painting a bleak picture of our economy last week, it is no surprise that there are few, if any, restaurant openings planned for the rest of the 2019/2020 summer season. 

Exhibit A of Chefs Rikku O’Donnchü and Warwick King opened on Bree Street on Friday. La Chêne opened at Leeu Estates in Franschhoek two weeks ago. Cowboys & Cooks is running late in opening its planned new restaurant in De Waterkant.

 

Cape Town restaurant openings 

Continue reading →

Interest rate drops another 0,5 %

Governor of the Reserve Bank, Tito Mboweni, caught the market and most economists by surprise today, by cutting the interest rate by 50 basis points, to 7 %, a positive sign that may signal a reversal of the credit crunch.

The interest rate is an indication that the recovery of the economy has not been progressing as speedily as the government would like it, given the previous interest rate cuts since December.  It could also be Mboweni bowing to the pressure from trade union federation COSATU for a cut in the interest rate.   Finally, the cut may be a reflection of the slow but certain decrease in the rate of inflation.

The cut in the interest rate eases the pressure on family and buusiness incomes, and should have a positive effect on tourism.

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