Load-shedding has been a recurring problem for many years and has caused a lot of damage to a number of businesses to an extent that the majority of businesses in South Africa have closed and thousands of people have lost their jobs. According to reports approximately 350 000 people have lost their jobs and 71% of businesses have been affected by loadshedding due to the rolling blackouts that have become a constant feature in our country.
Chicken Land Store in Orlando East and Ka-Pitseng restaurant in Diepkloof (Zone 6) are amongst the small businesses that are ‘badly’ affected by load-shedding and has proven to be lethal and very bad for businesses.
‘‘4 of the 5 fridges we own are damaged and that affects the way we stock meat and products that need to be stored in cool areas. As business owners we buy less stock and that affects our profit which will lead to salary cuts for employees or even worse job losses’’, says Nelson Messtre the manager at Chicken Land Store.
Mr Messtre also revealed that customers no longer come in numbers like before and close to R30,000-R40,000 was lost over stock because it got rotten.
He went on to say ‘’Over and above that we have to spend close to R20,000 to fix each of the damaged refrigerators and other electrical appliances. On the issue of retrenchment, it is the hardest thing to do even though we haven’t decided on how we are going handle the issue, also it is undecided on whether there will be retrenchments or not pending whether the rolling blackouts will end’’
Meanwhile: The owner of Ka Pitseng restaurant Nelly Motsoari says her business is also ‘badly’ affected by the load-shedding especially when it comes to profit. She says ever since this load-shedding started she has lost 70 % and above of the profit that her restaurant makes.
‘’ There was a time in January this year when we didn’t have electricity for a week and I had to throw away 80% of the stock because we didn’t have a backup generator, in all I was throwing away money and only few customers were coming in, even now, so there won’t be any profit in that’’, says Nelly.
This also forced her to retrench some of the workers, which was the most difficult decision she had to make, which also added to the number of 350 000 people who lost their jobs in South Africa. She also revealed that it’s even difficult to pay rent and her workers and looking at things she will end up closing the restaurant.
‘’ I had to retrench half of my staff because I was not going to pay them all, paying rent and also buying gas for back-up when there’s loadshedding. By the look of things I will end up closing this restaurant too because I have lost so much money on stock damage and the business is going down bit by bit’’, she added