Growth outlook darkens for 2026
Commodity gains offer only temporary relief to fiscal pressures
Growth-wise South Africa faces a tough 2026. While the 2025 GDP growth rate of 1.1% was an improvement on the 0.5% in 2024, it was largely driven by household final consumption expenditure, which grew 3.6% year on year, contributing 2.4 percentage points to growth.
Worryingly, gross fixed capital formation ― the measure of investment in fixed assets such as infrastructure, heavy plant equipment and machinery ― declined by 2.2% year on year, contributing minus 0.3 of a point.
