Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni tabled Statistics South Africa’s 2026-27 budget, revealing measurable progress in reducing poverty and inequality, though the country remains far from the finish line.
Stats SA gets R2.98 billion, but the minister says it’s not enough
South Africa’s national statistics agency has been allocated R2.98 billion for the 2026-27 financial year, rising to R3.09 billion and R3.20 billion over the following two years.
This is an average growth rate of 3.9%. However, Ntshavheni was candid about the limitations of that figure when she presented Budget Vote 14 to Parliament on 13 May 2026.
“I must upfront indicate that this allocation is not enough,” Ntshavheni told the House.
The budget covers seven programme areas, with the largest portion – R961.6 million – going to Statistical Operations and Provincial Coordination, followed by Administration at R842.3 million.
Statistical Support and Informatics receives R343.2 million, while Economic Statistics and Population and Social Statistics are allocated R315.1 million and R304 million, respectively.
The South African National Statistics System receives the smallest share at R46.1 million.
Ntshavheni framed the investment as far more than a departmental line item.
“Supporting this Budget Vote is an investment in our ability to govern effectively in a rapidly changing world,” she said.
“As climate shocks intensify, technology accelerates, and global uncertainty grows, timely and credible statistics are no longer optional – they are essential to informed decision-making and national resilience.”
Millions remain trapped below food poverty line
The centrepiece of the budget debate was the December 2025 Poverty Trends in South Africa report, which tracks absolute poverty between 2006 and 2023 using data from Stats SA’s Income and Expenditure Survey and Living Conditions Survey.
According to the minister, the share of South Africans living below the Lower Bound Poverty Line fell from 57.5% in 2006 to 37.9% in 2023, translating to a drop from 27.3 million to 23.2 million people.
Those living in extreme poverty, below the Food Poverty Line, declined from 27.4% to 17.6% over the same period, meaning 2.2 million fewer people were living in food poverty in 2023 compared to 2006.
Ntshavheni acknowledged both the gains and the gap.
“Despite the significant progress in decreasing the poverty headcount, 10.8 million people below the food poverty line is 10.8 million people too many,” she said.
She acknowledged the additional setback caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The minister further added that government would continue to use poverty line measurements “to improve the country’s ability to target developmental policies and programmes for interventions.”
She stressed that education remains one of the most powerful levers for addressing poverty, citing the Stats SA report’s finding that people with lower levels of education consistently recorded higher poverty headcounts.
It was on this basis that she described the implementation of the Basic Education Laws Amendment Act as “non-negotiable.”
She also called for expanding the National Student Financial Aid Scheme to include dependents of police officers, teachers, nurses and other public servants – people who frequently fall outside existing support thresholds despite facing real financial pressure.
“The aim is to build a more inclusive and sustainable student funding system that broadens opportunity while safeguarding the future viability of the scheme,” Ntshavheni said.
Job losses mount despite a R1 trillion infrastructure push
Stats SA’s first quarter 2026 Quarterly Labour Force Survey, released the day before the budget debate, delivered a sobering picture of the labour market.
Employment fell by 345 000 between the fourth quarter of 2025 and the first quarter of 2026, bringing the total number of employed persons to 16.8 million.
Ntshavheni pushed back on the idea that seasonal patterns could explain away the figures.
“The argument of an increase in unemployment due to first quarter trends of increased labour market entrants does not hold as the country experienced a decline in the number of employed persons,” she said.
The timing is particularly jarring, she noted, given that infrastructure investment is gaining momentum.
The Minister of Finance recently committed R1 trillion to infrastructure development in the 2026 National Budget, and the sixth South African Investment Conference generated more than R1.5 trillion in investment pledges. Yet job creation has not followed, at least not yet.
Data dismantles the narrative that foreign nationals are stealing South African jobs
The labour force data also speaks directly to one of the country’s most politically charged debates.
Drawing on the Migration Module of the Quarterly Labour Force Survey, Ntshavheni used the numbers to challenge claims that foreign nationals are displacing South African workers.
As of 2022, the unemployment rate for foreign-born persons stood at 18.2%, compared to 34% for locally born persons.
The absorption rate was 64% for foreign-born persons and 37.7% for those born locally, indicating that foreign-born persons were roughly twice as likely to be employed.
“The unemployment rate of foreign-born persons is almost half compared to that of locally born persons,” Ntshavheni said.
South Africa had 55 190 refugees and 82 410 asylum seekers as at 31 December 2025, and the Border Management Authority and the Department of Home Affairs are actively managing the presence of undocumented foreign nationals.
Ntshavheni said Cabinet has directed the Department of Employment and Labour to intensify workplace inspections in sectors such as hospitality, farming, trucking and construction, and has instructed municipalities to enforce trading by-laws more rigorously.
Ntshavheni also called on South Africans to stop sub-leasing their business licences to others.
On the policy front, the Revised White Paper on Immigration introduces a first-country-of-safety principle, proposes relocating refugee reception centres closer to borders, and includes provisions that enable government departments to designate certain trades, professions and businesses exclusively for South African citizens and refugees.
Inequality is shifting, but wealth remains concentrated at the top
South Africa’s Gini coefficient tells a story of mixed progress.
Stats SA data shows that the Gini estimates for black Africans and coloured South Africans declined between 2011 and 2023, while those for Indian and Asian as well as white South Africans increased over the same period.
The income share of the bottom 40% of earners rose from 4.4% in 2006 to 6.8% in 2023.
But as Ntshavheni noted, that improvement must be read in context: “Despite the increasing share of income going to the bottom 40% over recent years, the bulk of income is still concentrated with those at the top of the income ladder.”
There is, however, a structural shift underway.
The proportion of black households earning more than R75 000 a month climbed to 41% in 2024, up from 29% in 2012, according to Stats SA’s General Household Survey.
The number of black South Africans in the middle- and upper-income brackets quadrupled to more than seven million in 2024 from 2012.
Overall, the total number of South Africans in those income groups grew from roughly four million to more than 11 million between 2012 and 2024.
Official statistics are a defence against misinformation
Ntshavheni closed her speech by making an explicit case for the democratic value of official statistics, particularly in an environment of deliberate misinformation.
“Official statistics replace speculation with facts and rhetoric with reality,” she told Parliament.
“We live in an age of misinformation, where official data must compete with ‘alternative facts,’ speculation, and deliberately manipulated narratives.”
She called on South Africans broadly, and Members of Parliament specifically, to ground national discourse in verified data.
“Let us choose evidence over noise, facts over fiction, and data over doubt,” she said, adding that the credibility of Stats SA was “not luxuries – they are democratic necessities.”
