News 09:00

BULLETIN 7 June 9 am

Good morning. I am……..

In this bulletin:

# Government remains committed to sound public finances
# Minister Steenhuisen says government and agribusinesses needed to work more closely to expand support for emerging farmers
# And rugby: Leinster overcome the immense Stormers defensive effort to set up a Bulls final

# Government says it remains committed to sound public finances and implementing structural reforms that will support higher and more inclusive economic growth and underpin investor confidence. National Treasury Director-General, Duncan Pieterse, says improved sovereign credit ratings help to lower borrowing costs for government, businesses and households and have tangible benefits for ordinary people. He says South Africa still has some way to go to regain its investment grade credit rating but for the first time in more than a decade the country is seeing a clear turnaround in the downward ratings trend.

# Agriculture minister John Steenhuisen says the agriculture sector should play a leading role in shaping public private partnerships aimed at restoring efficiency and supporting export growth. He says government, financial institutions and agribusinesses needed to work more closely to expand support for emerging farmers and integrate them into commercial value chains. The minister says this includes expanding the use of commodity-backed lending, warehouse receipt systems, off-take agreements, blended finance guarantees and inventory-backed facilities that allow farmers to leverage verified commodity stock and productive cashflows alongside traditional forms of collateral.

# Cosatu has welcomed the appointment of the South African Post Office Board. Cosatu’s spokesperson, Matthew Parks says for far too long the Post Office has been allowed to deteriorate to a state of near collapse. He says the absence of dedicated and fit for purpose leadership has been at the centre of this painful decline in addition to SAPO’s failure to keep pace with structural shifts in the postal and communications sectors:

# The DA has written to the National Assembly speaker, Thoko Didiza to request a debate of national importance on president Cyril Ramaphosa’s failure to release the Water Crisis Plan for public scrutiny. The party’s Stephen Moore says the President missed the deadline to publicly release the National Water Crisis Action Plan. He says the President cannot make false promises to South Africans over months without being held accountable:

# Rugby: Defending champions Leinster overcame an immense defensive effort from the Stormers to clinch a hard-fought 20-11 United Rugby Championship semifinal win at the Aviva Stadium on Saturday night, to set up a replay of last season’s final against the Bulls at Croke Park. Despite being under constant pressure, the Stormers put up an incredible fight and were right in the game until the final 10 minutes when they were reduced to 13 men and Leinster pulled ahead with a converted try, which sealed the result.

And lastly, in other rugby news, the Springbok Sevens team completed a magnificent quarterfinal win over Fiji at the Bordeaux Sevens shortly after hearing they had won the HSBC World Championship and had been crowned the best Sevens team in the world. They will meet France in a semifinal this afternoon in the Bordeaux Sevens, but what happens doesn’t matter, as the crown was handed to them when their nearest rivals, Australia, were whitewashed 26-0 by France in their quarterfinal. This gave the Blitzboks an unassailable lead in the overall standings.

Stay tuned for more news………….