Nontando Mafanya

07 May 2016

the International Monetary Fund says in a statement South Africa's economy could swing back to recovery in 2017, but cautions that Africa's second largest economy would have to stave off expected further shocks from China, heightened global financial instability and independent debt credit rating downgrades.

An IMF team visited Cape Town, Pretoria and Johannesburg in the past two weeks and met Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan, South African Reserve Bank governor Lesetja Kganyago, Minister in the Presidency for Planning, Performance, Monitoring, Evaluation and Administration Jeff Radebe as well as labour federations and business leaders.

The mission also held discussions with Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies, Minister of Economic Development Ebrahim Patel, Commissioner of the South African Revenue Service Tom Moyane as well as other government officials during a visit that ended on Thursday.