Heading on the highway to Africa - 10 May 2010
By Sindy Peters, Africa editor
Coming up soon on the African events calendar is Highway Africa, the conference that hosts the continent's cream-of-the-crop journalism professionals as well as the budding newbies looking for some inspiration and a few tricks of the trade. On the agenda this year is how to operate in the globalised world and the new rules of engagement. If you can tear yourself away from keeping up with 2010 FIFA World Cup festivities and matches from 5-7 July, then you'll be happy to note registration for the annual event is now open.
Word on the retail street across Zim and South Africa is that Pick n Pay is set to acquire a larger portion of shares in TM Supermarkets as part of a recovery plan for the Kingdom Meikles group which, like most retail groups in Zimbabwe, took quite a financial knock during the free fall of the Zim dollar. The deal at the moment is very hush-hush and is being kept between executives.
Apart from newly launched TopTV going up against DStv, another battle is brewing. It seems South Africa might not adopt the digital video broadcasting (DVB-T) standard for terrestrial television as agreed in 2006; the country may very well go with Japan's integrated services digital broadcasting (ISDB-T) standard instead. One of the major problems lies in the fact that the SADC's choice needs to be unanimous to avoid cross-border radio spectrum interference, but not only is ISDB-T more expensive it could delay digital migration across the continent even further.
On a happier note, the workers who were involved from the start in building the 2010 stadiums will be rewarded with two tickets to one of the World Cup games. Now that's a nice way of saying thank you for all your efforts in making an Africa dream now a reality. Well done FIFA and the 2010 LOC!
