A recent modelling of ways to move the poorest South Africans out of this bracket shows it can be done through social transfers that might sound expensive, but are worth the cost.

South Africa has been struggling for decades to reduce poverty, inequality and unemployment and raise the rate of economic growth.

Economic growth has been slow since a recession in 2008. The annual growth rate averaged 1.1% between 2009 and 2021, slowing to 0.6% in 2023. Unemployment stubbornly remains above 30%. It was 32.9% in the first quarter of 2024.

The country's Gini coefficient, a measure of how income is distributed across the population, is estimated to be 0.63, one of the worst in the world.

Poverty levels remain high too. A large number of people live in extreme poverty. According to Statistics South Africa, an estimated 40.0% of the population - or 25 million people - have a monthly consumption expenditure of below R9,096, which is used as the lower-bound poverty line, and 55.5% of the population falls within the upper-bound poverty line, with monthly consumption expenditure of below R13,656.

This is despite the government's extensive spending on social assistance and other support mechanisms. In the 2023/24 fiscal year, there were 18.8 million social grant beneficiaries (about 35% of the population) with an annual cost to the fiscus of R217.1-billion. This is expected to...