Drought devastates agriculture and could cost SA R2bn in trade losses

The extreme and persistent drought has led to national agricultural production declining by more than 42%, an analysis by the Western Cape provincial government has revealed.

Western Cape economic opportunities MEC Alan Winde said on Wednesday that his economic planning unit had completed an early assessment of the effect of the drought. "This drop in production resulted in a 1.1% decrease in the country’s gross domestic production," he said.

But Western Cape local government department spokesman James-Brent Styan said: "Following an assessment by national (disaster management), it was decided it wasn’t necessary at the moment to do a provincial disaster classification… The situation is permanently monitored and may change when and if needed."

Last week, the disaster centre declared the Witzenberg, Prins Albert and Oudtshoorn municipalities local disaster areas.


Source: BDLive
Fri 22 Jan 2016 at 08:05