South Africa's President Cyril Ramaphosa on Tuesday announced a $26 billion relief package aimed at stimulating the economy and cushion the vulnerable people during the coronavirus pandemic.
In a special address to the nation, Ramaphosa announced "a massive social and economic support package of 500 billion rand ($26.3 billion), which amounts to about 10 percent of our GDP."
"The impact of the coronavirus requires an extraordinary coronavirus budget...the scale of this emergency programme is historical," he said.
Before the virus arrived last month, Africa's most advanced economy was already reeling from a recession, deteriorating public finances and a swollen budget deficit.
The economy which grew by a paltry 0.3 percent last year, is now expected to contract by 6.1 percent, according to the central bank.
Ramaphosa said a portion of the virus relief funds will be redirected from the current budget and the rest would be sourced from the local unemployment insurance fund and from global partners and international finance institutions.
South Africa is in its fourth week of a five-week lockdown imposed expected to run to the end of April.
With many people out of work or companies shut down to observe the lockdown "poverty and food insecurity have deepened dramatically in the course of just a few weeks," said Ramaphosa.
Scenes of people fighting for food parcels or looting from supermarkets, have been reported in parts of the country.
Around $2.6 billion would be channelled towards the most vulnerable people through social grants.
Around a quarter of a million food parcels would be distributed over the next two weeks.
Ramaphosa said the country was embarking on a phase aimed at stabilising the economy and address the decline in supply and demand and protect jobs.
The unemployed and workers whose employers have been able to pay their wages, will also get relief from the fund.
An official study published earlier in the said found that almost two-thirds of businesses believed the pandemic would have a "substantially worse impact" on their business compared with the 2008/9 financial crisis.
The country has so far reported 58 deaths out of 3,465 coronavirus infections, slightly behind Egypt.
"Medical doctors inform us that we are still in the early stages of this pandemic," Ramaphosa warned, adding that the lockdown would not abruptly end but would be eased out in phases.
World
India
State & District Details
State | Cases | Active | Recovered | Deaths |
---|
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
"Completely Blank...": Rohit Sharma Reveals Turning Point For India In T20 World Cup Final Court Says Some Games Fixed During India vs South Africa Series In 2000 From FLiRT To FLuQE: What To Know About The Latest Covid Variants Bangladesh Imposes Curfew, Deploys Military As 105 Die In Protests "Jindal Group Executive Showed Porn, Groped Me On Flight": Woman To NDTV Over 300 Indian Students Return Home As 105 Bangladeshis Killed In Protests Joe Biden Is The Best Person To Take On Trump, Says His Campaign Wife Among Two Jailed For Life For Man's Murder In Gurugram: Cops 1,100 Flights Cancelled In US As Microsoft Outage Disrupts Operations Track Latest News Live on NDTV.com and get news updates from India and around the world.