South Africa’s Economic Firepower: Now vs 2008 Crisis in Charts

South Africa emerged from the 2008 global financial crisis in strong position thanks to robust economic growth and a budget surplus when the downswing came. A rapid deterioration in public finances over the past decade means the opposite is likely after the coronavirus pandemic.

“We’re starting off this crisis in a far worse position than what we started off the global financial crisis,” said Johann Els, chief economist at Old Mutual Investment Group. “During that period, we also started off with much stronger economic growth; now we’re starting off from a position of less than 1% gross domestic product growth per year on average over the past six years.”