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May 24 2012 17:31
The Reserve Bank will maintain current interest rates, and a sizeable reduction in the local petrol price is expected, says governor Gill Marcus.
May 24 2012 15:29
The Reserve Bank will maintain current interest rates, says governor Gill Marcus.
May 23 2012 22:00
Economic liberation or the lack thereof is the most divisive issue in the country, according to a survey.
Johannesburg, South Africa has been ranked 24th in a study that
shows that countries that protect the physical and intellectual property of their people enjoy nearly nine times higher GDP per capita than countries ranking lowest in property rights protections.
The study, the 2009 International Property Rights Index (IPRI),
compared the protections of physical and intellectual property to economic stability in 115 countries representing 96% of the world's GDP.
The Free Market Foundation (FMF) and 53 organisations from six continents joined the Property Rights Alliance in Washington, DC and its Hernando de Soto Fellowship programme to disseminate the report.
The 2009 IPRI is a composite ranking of three comprehensive areas of property rights: legal and political environment, physical property rights, and intellectual property rights. Of the 115 countries included, the top quartile averaged $39 991 in GDP per capita while the average in the bottom
twenty per cent was only $4 341 per capita.
The second, third and fourth quartiles averaged $23 982, $11 748, and $4 891 respectively. The nearly
linear data trend shows that countries placing a high priority on property rights see increased economic security.
Leon Louw, FMF Executive Director, said: "Governments of wealthy countries are clearly more successful than those of low income countries at protecting all forms of property rights. Greater access to resources is an obvious advantage in protecting property rights but governments of low per
capita income countries could raise the incomes of their citizens faster if they gave greater attention to the protection of property rights and utilised more of taxes raised for protection purposes."
"South Africa is ranked 24th together with Spain and South Korea, which places SA in the top 20% of the 115 countries included in the study," Louw said.
"SA's overall score declined from 6.9 in 2008 to 6.8 (out of 10). The score for intellectual property rights improved from 7.0 to 7.4, a creditable improvement, while that for the legal and political environment (LP) declined from 6.6 to 5.9.
"A good LP score is dependent on judicial independence, the application of the rule of law, political stability and the control of corruption in the country being measured, so SA's reduced score in this area, while expected, is unfortunate" he said.
- I-Net Bridge