| INTRODUCTION
The period under review remained extremely volatile and unpredictable, with a slow recovery evident in international markets, particularly in African resources and Eastern European concessions, but a domestic market that is regarded as the worst in decades. Against these difficult markets, the group took a decision not to chase order book at the expense of cash and quality of work, but rather to look for better margin work outside of South Africa, preserve cash, cut costs rather than to carry them and not to fund low margin building contracts.
Whilst the group’s Construction, Manufacturing and Concessions businesses have performed well in light of
these tough market conditions, further adverse cyclical and recent fundamental changes in the Construction
Materials markets, particularly in the aggregates and readymix markets, have occurred. This resulted in the
group taking a revised and more conservative view in terms of the future of this cluster and processing a
further impairment, as outlined below.
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