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Monday, October 26, 2009.

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I'm Shannon de Ryhove.

Making headlines today:

Zambian state power utility Zesco and South Africa's TATA Africa are in talks with a European and African development bank about raising cash for a 200-million-dollar power generation project.

The 120-MW Itezhi-tezhi hydroelectric project is being developed by the Itezhi-tezhi Power Corporation, a company jointly owned by Zesco and TATA Africa.

Construction of the power station is expected to begin in the first quarter of 2010 and the project will be commissioned by March 2012.

Investec economist Annabel Bishop said on Friday that South Africa was likely to be out of the recession by the fourth quarter of this year, while gross domestic product growth of 1,5% is expected in 2010.

She said that South Africa's recovery was lagging global recovery by one to two quarters, owing to the timing of the recoveries of its key trading partners, namely Japan and Europe.

She noted that this retarding effect was proving to be far more significant in driving South Africa's recession than the previous interest rate hikes, although the institution of the National Credit Act was playing a significant role.

Government and parastatal fixed investment continued to improve, although not at a pace sufficient enough to address the infrastructure challenges of the next five years, and electricity load-shedding would likely constrain growth to around 5%.

Despite the country's big public spend still ongoing, Bishop predicted that the budget deficit would rise above 8% in the 2009/10 financial year, from the current 3,2% deficit, owing to the drop off in revenue and the recession.

Also making headlines:

Global steel output rises to 107-million-tons in September.
The Department of Public Works is working on a far-reaching initiative to extract greater economic and social value from its large property portfolio.
MTN SA and Vodacom reach an agreement to lower their mobile termination rates.
And, South Africa's coal-to-liquid specialist Sasol will integrate carbon capture into it's China project design.

That's a round up of news making headlines today. For more on these and other stories please visit engineeringnews.co.za.