South Africa's economic growth rate is experiencing its longest upswing in the country's history, with the economy notching up its thirty-third quarter of uninterrupted growth since 1998. Real annual gross domestic product increased by 5% in 2006.

The government is in process of fine-tuning the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative for South Africa (Asgi-SA), to accelerate the country's growth rate and to ensure that the growth is accompanied by job creation.

A draft charter on statistics for the African continent, The African Statistics Charter, has been developed. The charter has been designed to establish an African economic community, with access to regular and reliable statistical data.

The charter aims to:

Serve as an advocacy tool for the development of statistics in Africa Ensure quality statistics that are comparable across countries and regions Promote professionalism and the fundamental principles of official statistics Strengthen the institutional and infrastructural capacity of statistical authorities Ensure their autonomy and independence from political interference in their operations Serve as a professional code of ethics and good practices for statisticians Promote a culture of evidence-based decision making, policy formulation, monitoring and evaluation and Contribute to the strengthening and effective functioning of an African statistical system