Martyn Emery noticed that I had made a brief reference to Cargill's decision to halt trading in South Africa (SA) from mid-Dec to mid-Jan; he sent me a note indicating that he understood a meeting was scheduled to take place in SA on Sep 6th (Labor Day) between Cargill's, people from the Gartner Group, and people from the SA gov't.

I got the attached e-mail this morning from Feriel Bowers in SA:

Dear Martyn and Ed

Thank you for your interest in South Africa. On Friday, 2 September 1999, Cargill clarified their position vis-a-vis South Africa in a media release.

The release indicates: "Cargill will service customers over the Millennium period however as with all business, whether or not Cargill is able to execute trades depends on a number of outside business factors prevailing at that time."

The company also notes that the December / January period is traditionally "a quiet time of year in South Africa" and that they would be running their offices in South Africa "on a reduced staff".

They further said that they have reviewed the latest Gartner report and noted the significant change in South Africa's ratings.

The Y2K Centre (South Africa) disputes the findings of Gartner (whether positive or negative) <<6 September 1999.doc>> and wishes the world to note that we have completed remedial work in all critical sectors. Contingency plans will be finalised at the end of this month. These plans will be tested during October/November.

South Africa is therefore ready to trade with any country during the December/January period. ------------------------------------ Attached is the text of the press release... ------------------------------------ South Africa ready to trade during rollover period

Pretoria 6 Sept. In response to media reports last week concerning international trade over the transition (December 1999  January 2000), the State Information Technology Agency (SITA) convened a meeting to clarify the basis for concerns that South Africa will not be able to execute trade over the rollover period.

The meeting emphasised that there is evidence to support that provided South Africa does not relax its current efforts, it is well prepared to meet the challenges of trading with the world over the Year 2000.

The meeting was attended by amongst others representatives of the National Year 2000 Decision Support Centre ("the Y2K centre"), the Department of Agriculture, the South African Reserve Bank and the Government Communications and Information Systems.

Investigations prior to the meeting established that there was no substance to the concerns and that media reports suggesting an unwillingness of key traders to conduct business as usual over the critical period were based on misconstruance of partial information.

In a statement last week, GartnerGroup said information about South Africas year 2000 remediation progress recently made public "is not reflected in GartnerGroups latest world status report". GartnerGroup currently lists South Africas current status as one of 17 countries that have made significant progress in their year 2000 remediation.

ISSUED BY:

Feriel Bowers, National Year 2000 Decision Support Centre, 27 12 427 8232 Communications@y2k.org.za

-- Ed Yourdon (HumptyDumptyY2K@yourdon.com), September 07, 1999

Answers

Thanks Ed,

Do you get the feeling that sometime this fall "the whole world" will announce it's Y2K ready?

Then the truth of that will begin to surface after mid-night and into next spring. 2000 -- The Year of the Global Muddle.

Diane

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), September 07, 1999.

Good morning,

In case you missed it, I found this on Yahoo Y2K news yesterday. <:)=

S. Africa Calms Y2K Fear After Cargill Warning

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), September 07, 1999.

Contingency plans will be finalised at the end of this month. These plans will be tested during October/November.

Doh . . . Contingency plans will be tested in October/November. Guess the pollys are right . . . No problem dude. :)

-- Rick (rick7@postmark.net), September 07, 1999.

Does ANYONE sell a spin-arrester (like a lightning arrester) so I can read some of these posts?? My monitor just sits and spins and I have a hard time reading the spinning blurs. . . . . . ;-)

Night Train

-- Jes' a dizzy ol footballer (NightTr@in.Lane), September 07, 1999.