Tuesday, 4 October 2016

SA People


South Africa Scoops Five Wins at Global Pageant in Turkey

By
 SAPeople
 -

   

South Africans were the biggest winners at the 2016 global World League of Beauty & Fashion pageant in Bodrum, Turkey on Saturday night, walking away with an unprecedented five titles!

South African Teen World Winners
In a message to SAPeople, SA pageant organiser Carolyn Baldwin Botha said: “I am more than SUPER PROUD of #TeamPageantsSA #PageantsSA.”
Zenande Mncwabe (7) from Richard’s Bay won Little Miss Universe 2016 title, Deanté Swart (9) from Greytown was crowned Little Miss World, Chante Green (11) from Mossel Bay won Little Miss Globe, Mpho Botha (15) from Welkom won Mr Teen World and Andrea Abrahams (20) from Mpumulanga won Miss 7 Continents.
Carolyn said: “This is an achievement above all that my heart could have wished for. Well done to all my contestants and also to their amazing parents. Wow my heart is overflowing with pride…”
Zenande and Mpho also received Best of the Best & Best Talent; Chante received Miss Sympathy; Deanté was awarded Photo Model of the World and Overall Winner of the competition and received an Honorary Membership to the WLBF (World League of Beauty & Fashion); and Andrea won Face of Beauty & Face of the Elizabeth Friedrich.
Carolyn attributed South Africa’s incredible success – winning each age category – to a fantastic selection of those to represent the country, as well as the fact that they entered several competitions beforehand to get lots of practice.

Deanté’s proud Wembley College headmaster, Dederick Swart, said: “this is the first time in 25 years that a child as young as 9 years old has ever received this award!
“She is not only the first South African child to ever receive it, she was also selected as the overall winner of this prestigious international competition in which she competed against participants who were between 5 and 26 years of age!”

He said “Deante also has a heart of gold and is extremely dedicated to community outreach and charity work.  She even intoduced Takkie Tax internationally this year! I can’t wait to see the impact she will do with these international titles. Love to see such talent, success and acts of kindness from such a young age! She truly lives her motto “BE THE CHANGE”!” 

Meanwhile in Welkom, the proud folks there are planning an official dinner to celebrate Mpho’s Mr Teen World win!
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Forbes

 2,635 VIEWS

South African Billionaire Stephen Saad Scoops Entrepreneur Of The Year Award

Mfonobong Nsehe ,  
 CONTRIBUTOR
I chronicle Africa's success stories and track its richest people  
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.
South African pharma billionaire Stephen Saad has been announced as the winner of the Entrepreneur of the Year Award at the annual All Africa Business Leaders Awards (AABLA) gala banquet in Johannesburg on Friday.
At the awards, which was hosted in partnership with CNBC Africa and Forbes Africa, Stephen Saad said, “You work at something and you build something together with the team and seldom have time to look back. To be recognized for it in this way is wonderful and particularly so for Aspen. We are a company with roots in South Africa and manufacturing in South Africa. We’ve grown our local talent to become a world player and Aspen is just a wonderful South African story.”
Saad, who is the founder of Aspen Pharmacare, Africa’s largest pharmaceuticals company, said that one of the biggest challenges he has faced recently was breaking into the generics market.
“Aspen competes with multinationals – we started a domestic company and have gone offshore to become a global company manufacturing in South Africa for domestic and export markets,” Saad said.
“Going forward we will continue to look for strategic partners. We have completed a number of significant transactions and Aspen has built a really strong foundation now. Our aspiration in the short term is to build on that base and to double our size.”
Traded on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, Aspen Pharmacare markets generic medicines in 150 countries. Saad famously became a millionaire at age 29 after he sold his share in the drug business Covan Zurich for $3 million. He now has a net worth FORBES estimates at $1.27 billion.
Follow me on Twitter @MfonobongNsehe.
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News24

SA voted top dream destination

2013-05-09 14:56

London - South Africa has beaten six other sought after world destinations to take the coveted top spot in travel-related social network, Wayn's recent dream destination competition.
Up against six other sought after destinations - Brazil, India, Dubai, Fiji, Turkey and Indonesia - South Africa managed to garner more than 15 300 votes from all over the world. 
Brazil scooped up the second position, while Dubai came in at a very close third. 
Jerome Touze, co-founder and CRO of WAYN said: "All seven countries and cities nominated were extremely worthy contenders and dream destinations in their own right. The immense popularity of South Africa as a tourist destination has been reinforced by this competition, and interestingly the activity we are seeing correlates with the recent announcement by President Jaco Zuma that the amount of foreign visitors to South Africa has grown by 300% to 13.5 million visitors, 9.2 million of which were tourists.
It is also fascinating to note the strong interest coming from Asia, and particular India, which is one of South Africa's BRICS partners. Out of the 408,000 fans of South Africa on WAYN, there are now over 108,000 fans from India alone"
In total 78 000 votes were counted for all seven of the destinations. The nominated destinations, both cities and countries, were selected through a combination of market research data and tracking user engagement on WAYN.com. WAYN built an exclusive microsite for the competition and offered members who voted the chance to win an iPad.
Touze added "We are delighted by the phenomenal response from our members, the total number of people who voted exceeded our expectations and offers invaluable intel on where our members want to go. We are planning to build on the success of this campaign over the next year by offering more leading award recognitions for the travel and tourism industry"
Thulani Nzima, Chief Executive Officer, South African Tourism said: "We are privileged to live in an incredible country, a land of spectacular wildlife, awe-inspiring adventure and unique heritage and culture. It is home to warm, welcoming people, eager to share it with travellers from around the world. We are already touched by the hundreds of thousands of friends our destination has made on the WAYN.com platform and we are delighted with this accolade, which we hope will make more people's dreams of visiting South Africa a reality." 
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Monday, 3 October 2016

African News

Cisco announced the winners of its Africa Channel Partner Awards at the Cisco One Africa Partner Summit 2015 which took place last week from 23rd – 25th June 2015 in Limpopo, South Africa. The awards recognised the top-performing Cisco Channel partners across the African region. Awarded to exemplary Africa channel partners, the Cisco One Africa Partner Summit awards are designed to recognize best-in-class business practices and serve as a model to the industry within their respective regions. Areas of consideration include innovative practices, architecture-led approach successes, strategic business outcome-focused programs, seizing new opportunities and sales approaches.
“Cisco is proud to work with our Partner Ecosystem across Africa which continues to evolve in size and type in order to best deliver customer business outcomes and expand capabilities to address new market opportunities.  As countries, cities and organisations across the African continent embrace the Internet of Everything (IoE) our work with our channel partners will be key to helping customers catch the market transitions right in order to reinvent themselves,” said David Meads, Vice President Cisco Africa. “It was an honour to be able to recognise our partners at our Africa Partner Summit 2015, further underscoring their outstanding accomplishments across the continent.”
All award recipients were selected by Cisco Worldwide Partner Organisation and regional executives.
Winners of the One Africa Partner Summit 2015 Awards were:
  1. Africa Partner of the Year: Telkom
  2. Africa Security Partner of the Year: Business Connexion
  3. Africa Collaboration Partner of the Year: Comstor South Africa
  4. Emerging Cloud and Managed Services Partner of the Year: Dimension Data
  5. Africa Architectural Excellence Data Center Partner of the Year: SEE Egypt
  6. Africa Solution Innovation Award: Dimension Data
  7. Emerging Services Partner of the Year: Business Connexion
  8. Emerging Architectural Excellence Service Provider Architecture Partner of the Year: Equinox
  9. Africa Architectural Excellence Enterprise Networks Partner of the Year: Dimension Data
  10. Africa Distribution Partner of the Year: Comstor Africa

About Cisco:

Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) is the worldwide leader in IT that helps companies seize the opportunities of tomorrow by proving that amazing things can happen when you connect the previously unconnected. For ongoing news, please go tohttp://thenetwork.cisco.com.
Cisco and the Cisco logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Cisco and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and other countries. A listing of Cisco's trademarks can be found at www.cisco.com/go/trademarks. Third-party trademarks mentioned are the property of their respective owners. The use of the word partner does not imply a partnership relationship between Cisco and any other company.
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SA News

South Africa scoops gold at the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair

28 Apr 2012
The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) pavilion at the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair won the Best Stand Award in a glittering ceremony in Bulawayo yesterday. The Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry, Ms Elizabeth Thabethe received the award from the Zambian President Michael Sata on behalf of the department. President Robert Mugabe, Vice President Joice Mujuru and numerous Zimbabwean Cabinet ministers also attended the ceremony, which was the highlight of the international fair that started on Tuesday, April 24 and will end today. Mozambique and Zambia were second and third, respectively in the competition.
The deafening sound of the Vuvuzela reverberated throughout Hall 4 of the Zimbabwe International Exhibition Centre as South African exhibitors and government officials sang Shosholoza to celebrate their victory.
"The award could not have come at a better time as people at home are celebrating eighteen years of democracy today, and we are also having our own celebration for being the country’s good ambassadors," quipped Deputy Minister Thabethe.
"This award does not belong to the DTI  but to South Africa as a country in general. For us to be crowned the best exhibitor in an international fair in which more than 30 countries are participating is a great achievement. We are all proud of this award as it shows that we as a department have represented the country well. It also means that the quality of the companies that are exhibiting in our stand have created a good impression among the judges, and the visitors," she added.
Thabethe said that the fair, which was held under the theme, "Investing Locally, Reaping Globally", was not only a perfect platform for the South African companies to market themselves and gain international exposure, but numerous of them also made good deals.
One of those companies was Unica Plastic Moulders, which successfully negotiated good deals with three Zimbabwean companies. The company's Sales Director, Mr Abid Qasim said his Pretoria-based company clinched a deal to supply a Zimbabwe company, Power Sales Group's 130 stores with plastic houseware.
Mr Zameer Mohammed, whose company Zambrands is based in Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal, said he also got orders to supply Zimbabwean stores with his products, which include spices, instant milkshakes, tea and coffee.
Earlier in the day, President Mugabe visited the DTI pavilion and was taken on a tour by Deputy Minister Thabethe.
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Saturday, 1 October 2016

SA News

Social Development on Technology Innovation World award

6 Nov 2015

Gender-Based Violence Command Centre wins best Technology Innovation World award

The Department of Social Development’s Gender-Based Violence Command Centre (GBVCC) – a 24-hour call centre dedicated to providing support and counselling to victims of gender based violence – has been named the Best Technology Innovation – Small Centre of the world at the Global Best Contact Centre Awards in Las Vegas on November 5.
As the Gold Medal Winner, this means the GBVCC is ranked number one in the world in its category.
This adds to three other highly acclaimed service awards the GBVCC has won since its launch in March 2014 – the Innovation Award in the Contact Centre Management Group (CCMG) awards, the Changing Lives Award in the Africom Awards, as well as the Golden Award won in the Technological Innovation Awards in London.
Minister for Social Development, Ms Bathabile Dlamini, says the international recognition of the GBVCC communicates the South African government’s commitment to fighting gender-based violence to the rest of the world and places the country at the lead of international best practice against gender-based violence.
“We launched the Command Centre as part of our service delivery improvement programme aimed at responding quicker, more effectively and innovatively to social challenges in the country, Project Mikondzo.  Being recognised for best technology innovation in the world confirms that we are on the right track and it inspires us to work even harder to find inventive ways of responding effectively to the social challenges in the country.
“The award comes just a few weeks before we launch the 16 Days of Activism for No Violence Against Women and Children 2015 Campaign and emboldens us to work harder to eradicate violence against women and children.  We express our thanks to the organisations who have partnered with us in making this project a reality,” said Minister Dlamini.
The GBVCC uses mobile technology to estimate the location of a victim, assign the closest social worker in the field to the case, and record and receive continuous feedback on the case.  When a caller contacts the GBVCC from a mobile phone, they are (with explicit permission) geographically located, enabling the Centre to determine the resources nearest to the caller, whether it be a social worker, a police station, a hospital or safe house.  In this way, help is dispatched in quick fashion.
The toll free number to call to speak to a social worker for assistance and counselling is 0800 428 428 (0800 GBV GBV).  Callers can also request a social worker from the Command Centre to contact them by dialling *120*7867# (free) from any cell phone.
The GBVCC emanated from the work of the Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC) on the Root Causes of Violence Against Women and Children – chaired by Minister Dlamini.
The IMC was established by President Jacob Zuma in May 2012 to reinforce political leadership and accountability in the national prevention and response to the rising figures of sexual violence in our country.
The membership of the IMC comprises of the Ministers of Justice and Constitutional Development; Women; Home Affairs; Police and Basic Education.  Through the GBVCC, the work of this Committee is certainly contributing towards the improvement of the country response to and prevention of sexual violence.
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SA News

Minister Pandor congratulates Prof. Tebello Nyokong on winning the African Union Kwame Nkrumah Scientific Award

The Minister of Science and Technology, Naledi Pandor, has congratulated Prof. Tebello Nyokong, a distinguished scientist from Rhodes University, on winning the prestigious African Union Kwame Nkrumah Scientific Award.
The award ceremony took place on Saturday, 30 January 2016 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, during the opening of the 26th Ordinary Session of the African Union General Assembly for Heads of State and Government.
Minister Pandor said that this proved that South Africa and Africa have world-class scientists. "Our congratulations go to Prof. Tebello Nyokong for shining the spotlight on South Africa by winning such a prestigious award."
Last year, another distinguished South African scientist, Prof. Salim Abdool Karim, won the same award.
Advancing the African space programme to address Africa's socio-economic challenges
Minister Pandor said that she was also pleased that the 26th Ordinary Session of the African Union General Assembly for Heads of State and Government meeting had adopted the African Space Policy and the African Space Strategy, which the African Ministerial Council on Science and Technology (AMCOST) commissioned in 2012.
South Africa chaired the working group that undertook the work of developing the African Space Policy and the African Space Strategy.
Space-derived services such as Earth observation and satellite communications, navigation and positioning are crucial for the socio-economic development of the African continent. Over the past four decades such services have played a significant role in international, national and regional economic and social development efforts.
Such efforts include the proactive management of disease outbreaks, natural resources and the environment, responses to natural hazards and disasters, weather forecasting, climate-change modelling and monitoring, agriculture and food security, and peacekeeping missions and conflicts. In this respect, space science and technologies that enable the delivery of essential services and products are vitally important for the continent.
Affirming her support for the development of the African space programme, Minister Pandor said, "The benefits of such a programme include assisting in the development of a high-tech sector. This also has potential spin-offs for other fledgling industrial sectors and can provide benefits to the African continent."
Minister Pandor also thanked the formal working group for undertaking this historical work, which holds so much promise for securing an "integrated, prosperous and peaceful Africa, driven by its own citizens and representing a dynamic force in the global arena", as espoused in the African Union Vision.

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