Zamikhaya Maseti The looming labour dispute between BAIC, the Chinese automotive manufacturer, and the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) is undoubtedly unsettling. It comes at a time when South Africa’s economy is struggling to attain higher levels of growth, investment and employment creation. Yet the significance of
When the full text of the 14-point Memorandum of Understanding between the United States and Iran was released, analysts expecting the language of a balanced peace agreement found something rather different. What the document describes, point by point, is a near-total concession by the world’s most powerful military to a
In the past eighteen months, thirteen prospecting applications have been submitted to the Department of Minerals and Petroleum Resources across a 170-kilometre stretch of KwaZulu-Natal’s South Coast, eleven of them including lithium, one of the minerals most critical to the global energy transition. The trigger is SA Lithium’s Highbury Mine
The European Union has taken another significant step towards regulating artificial intelligence by publishing its long-awaited AI content labelling playbook ahead of key compliance deadlines under the EU AI Act. Released by the European Commission on 10 June, the voluntary Code of Practice provides practical guidance for developers and deployers
Those who have spent years watching Russia’s foreign policy pivot from the inside understand something that Western commentary consistently misreads: Moscow does not pursue relationships it cannot sustain. The warm optics of the Anwar-Putin bilateral in Kazan this week were real, but what matters far more than the handshake is
The double tax nobody talks about The core problem is this: South Africa has a domestic carbon tax, and the European Union has its own Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM). South African manufacturers exporting to Europe now have to contend with both. Former Trade Minister Rob Davies has called this
China should make the services sector the next major frontier of its reform and opening-up agenda, according to Yin Yanlin, a former deputy director of the Central Financial and Economic Affairs Commission and current vice chair of the Economic Affairs Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. In a
The language of Abu Dhabi’s partnership expansion with Chinese institutions, intelligent systems, advanced manufacturing, knowledge transfer, reads on the surface like standard diplomatic communiqué. Strip it back, and what it describes is one of the most consequential technology relationships a water-scarce region has ever needed to build. The Middle East’s
There is a number that captures the scale of Japan’s automotive reckoning with unusual clarity: $28 billion. That is the combined cost, in tariff exposure, EV write-downs and emissions-related restructuring charges absorbed by Japan’s major carmakers across the fiscal year ended March 2026. It is a figure that covers Toyota,
When China National Tire and Rubber Corporation (CNTR) announced a $550 million investment to expand its tyre manufacturing footprint in Alexandria, the headline was notable enough on its own terms: 1.5 million tyres a year, 1,600 new jobs, production starting in 2028. But the more revealing detail is the context