RFG Group – a JSE-listed food company with brands including Rhodes, Bull Brand, Ma Baker, and Bisto – says that Eskom’s frequent load shedding bouts have cost the group money, and it will look to further liberate itself from the grid in the coming months.
Alexforbes chief economist Isaah Mhlanga said recently that Eskom’s prolonged stage 6 load shedding caused significant damage to the country’s economy, wiping as much as R4 billion from the country’s GDP daily. South Africa has experienced 99 days of power cuts so far this year, according to Bloomberg calculations, and has suffered record outages with Eskom increasing rolling blackouts to 6,000 megawatts being taken from the national grid four times.
The group said it is investing in renewable energy infrastructure to reduce the impact of load shedding on the group’s production facilities, with solar installations planned for a further two sites in the months ahead. The group partnered with Energy Partners to complete a 928 KWp solar PV rooftop installation at its plant in Wellington.Despite the disruption, the group said that revenue for the 11 months to August 2022, however, it had increased by 21.2% after the group reported growth of 20.
Why do they keep operating here, wouldn't it make sense to move to a neighbouring country and export. Guessing it's not that easy.