Expert Urges Citizens to Be Thrifty Amid Economic Pressures As Black Friday and Festive Season Nears

• South Africans are expected to splurge during Black Friday and the upcoming festive season
• Economy expert Suvira Singh cautioned citizens about the unpredictable nature of the Rand
• Global and local factors have contributed to the Rand's performance and rising cost of living

With Black Friday and the festive season steadily approaching, South Africans are preparing to dust off their wallets and spend big.

While this time of year generally leads to people spending more than usual, an economy expert cautioned citizens to remain thrifty.

Speaking exclusively to Briefly News, Suvira Singh stated that South Africans are innately quite thrifty and will need to remain so.

Singh pessimistic about the outlook of the Rand

Looking ahead to how the Rand may perform in the future and how this could impact inflation, she stated that the Rand was quite tricky to forecast due to its dependency on countries internationally, which affected it accordingly.

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"For example, after the South African elections, the Rand appreciated, and now, after the recent American elections, it depreciated.

"The rand is proving to be quite volatile, similar to oil in recent times," she said.

She added that the rate of depreciation led to imports becoming more expensive, which could impact inflation.

"Most factors affecting or that have the most effect on the Rand are international and global factors. My outlook is ultimately quite pessimistic as the unpredictability in the global economy, and its effect on the Rand and inflation can mostly be seen only as and when it occurs."

What else has affected the Rand?

While the cost of living has been impacted by a host of global factors, like the Russian invasion of Ukraine, there have been events closer to home that also played its part.

The outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) affected poultry farmers across South Africa, negatively impacting the poultry sector. This led to considerable increases in poultry-related products from December 2023.

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"Egg price inflation increased substantially from 10.1% in August 2023 to 40.0% in November alone," Singh stated.

In addition to the avian flu outbreak, poultry prices were also impacted by the South African Revenue Service's reinstatement of anti-dumping duties in August 2023.

In May 2024, South Africa started experiencing Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) outbreaks, which hindered the country's ability to export animals and fresh meat to other countries. South Africa produces approximately 21.4% of the total meat produced on the (African) continent.

Can the Rand bounce back?

With the South African currency affected by a lot that isn't in the country's control, citizens have had to adapt over the years and will have to continue doing so.

"As much as we have reliance on many countries, they also highlight a multitude of avenues and alternatives to imports and exports of staple goods and commodities that need to be explored and pursued by South Africa to start relieving the pressure of global economic factors on the Rand as a whole.

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This is the only way I see the Rand “bouncing back” and being able to sustain global economic uncertainty.

South Africans are struggling to get by

In a related article, Briefly News recently discussed how South Africans are struggling to cope with the rising cost of living.

Single parents have been hit hard, but many explained they struggled to make ends meet even with two salaries in a household.

Sebastien Alexanderson of the National Debt Advisors explained that more people relied on credit to survive.

Source: Briefly News