Looking at our own backyard

Our last communication of 2024, I quoted from a book How Rich Countries Got Rich and Why Poor Countries Stay Poor. The author, Erik Reinert, characterises developed country aid to Africa as “palliative economics” as opposed to “developmental economics”, where the former promotes dependence on aid which he terms “welfare colonialism”. The table below, published by Adam Aboobaker of Manchester University in a paper written for the Cape Town-based Institute for African Alternatives (established by the late professor Ben Turok), is one indicator of where developmental economics could be applied to boost Africa’s energy generation infrastructure and consequently its manufacturing capacity.

The second Donald Trump presidency may have bigger fish to fry, but if there is a focus on Africa, it may not be a positive one, and we had best look at decreasing our trade dependency with the developed world, perhaps starting in our backyard in Africa.

We have recently updated South African trade figures with Africa in WOWEB to 2023 and will be adding 2024 in the next quarter. Exports to Africa as a percentage of total South African exports increased by 21.2% in 2021, 24.4% in 2022 and 26.8% in 2023. The following tables and graphic were compiled by consulting trade economist, Marthinus Havenga, of Cathkin Consulting.

Interestingly, Mozambique is our fourth-largest global export partner and, while a large portion of these exports are re-exported via Maputo, the political turmoil there is a cause for concern.

SADC absorbs the bulk of South African exports, and while the biggest growth went to Gambia, Eritrea, Liberia, Djibouti and Somalia, these are off a very low base. The potential for growing exports north of SADC is clearly represented in the following graphic. 

While statistics from the WOW ownership database show a slight decrease in the number of South African company-owned subsidiaries on the continent from 1,965 in 2024 to 1,929 in 2025, this remains a material foundation on which to build continental trade.

A material increase in trade with Africa is unlikely to be achieved without the state and private sector playing to each other’s strengths with a clear common objective. For instance, the trade/commercial attaches at all South African embassies and consulates are potentially a continental sales team for South African goods and services, and they should be given targets to identify new markets for South African companies. 

WOWEB client usage in 2024

2024 saw our overall WOWEB usage increase to 619 214 enquiries across our client base.  17 446 Industry reports were downloaded, with the most popular sectors in 2024 vs their ranking in 2023 being:

While healthy usage increases were observed across several of our research categories, the extent to which our non-South African research was accessed is noteworthy:

Recent WOWEB enhancements

Following on the new value chain capability introduced to WOWEB at the end of 2024 and which is now also accessible via the ‘Industry’ tab in each company profile, the WOW team continues in top gear at the start of 2025 with the introduction of advanced search capability.  From the ‘Home’ menu in WOWEB, users are now able to quickly and easily search across our full industry research reports, companies, directors and TakeOver Talk, and incorporate Boolean operator symbols to refine your search.  Previously industry report searches were limited to the report summaries and did not include Boolean logic capability.  We hope you will find the enhanced search function helpful in zooming in on all relevant research.

Within the next day or two, we will also be publishing additional ownership data classifications, which is a culmination of fruitful engagements with some of the larger financial services entities in our database to better assist users in differentiating between strategic vs non-strategic holdings.

Noma will be communicating details on the above enhancements during the course of next week.

In closing, the latest published reports on WOWEB, include the Tech Trends in South Africa report which is a sequel to the popular Fintech Trends in South Africa report.