Winemag.co.za presents the RisCura Red Hot Wine Awards 2016
In conjunction with RisCura, a global financial services provider, Winemag.co.za is pleased to announce the second annual Red Hot Wine Awards featuring Bordeaux-style red blends. The Bordeaux region in the southwest of France is famous for its red blends, the best of which have the ability to mature with benefit, for many years in bottle....
El Niño – beware the lag effect of this “weather bandit”
While the weather phenomenon appears to have passed, El Niño will continue to impact food security, food prices and humanitarian needs well into 2017, says a new Bright Africa special report from African investment specialists RisCura. Like the archetypal bandit in a classic Western, riding into town and wreaking havoc, El Niño has devastated many...
The effect of El Niño on key Southern African countries
The following section has a strong South Africa focus (the country considered best prepared, and where data is most readily available), which is used to illustrate some of the ripple-effects. Similar analyses can be applied on a regional or country basis. The chart below shows the World Food Programme’s projected timeline for how El Niño...
Opportunities arise from the storm
With issues highlighted by El Niño such as food and water security, poor infrastructure and lack of diversification in economies fresh in everyone’s minds, opportunities exist to highlight the importance of these issues and attempt to address them. Governments in collaboration with the DFIs and the private sector can start to prepare themselves...
Country responses
Country responses to El Niño have differed, with some limiting water usage, banning exports of maize, applying for emergency assistance, as highlighted in the preceding sections. Some additional measures implemented by Eastern and Southern African governments are highlighted below, with a view to illustrating the need for coordinated efforts, and...
An overview of El Niño in Africa
The mechanics of El Niño Despite its ominous name, El Niño is a natural meteorological event that occurs every seven to eight years. Trade winds across the Pacific weaken, and a body of warmer water that usually lies in the Western Pacific Ocean escapes eastward. The shift in temperatures and the release of heat into...
El Niño – threatening food security and disrupting markets
The weather phenomenon El Niño has loomed large in recent global news reports, and while officially considered over, its economic and humanitarian impacts are still mounting, and will continue well into 2017 and beyond. Like the archetypal bandit in a classic Western riding into town and wreaking havoc, El Niño has devastated many regions: some...
Impact on the production of key agricultural commodities
The map below illustrates some of the anticipated impacts in Africa at a country level. While drought conditions have affected Southern and Eastern Africa, a number of areas have experienced above-average rainfall. High rainfall may favour the production of certain crops, but an erratic pattern complicates planting and harvesting seasons, and flooding...
The high-level impact and ongoing effects of El Niño
The humanitarian impact and the economic ripple effects of El Niño are both numerous and interlinked. In an increasingly globalised and integrated world, disentangling and insulating individual effects on a country, population segment, or sector-basis is, therefore, difficult. However, a number of higher-level conclusions and forecasts can be made...
Private Equity Sector Focus
Although there has been a downward trend in activity over the past year, the consumer discretionary sector has continued to attract interest from investors, making up 22% of all transactions in 2015. A private equity sector focus of particular interest over the past few years has been online retail, education services such as tertiary...
