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Economy

Economic geography of South Africa

Economic geography is how a country makes a living: what it produces, where, and who gains.

CAPS

Grade 12 · Geography · Economy

Geography examines physical and human processes, with map skills in both papers.

  • The papers

    Paper 1 is climate and weather, and geomorphology, with geographical skills. Paper 2 is rural and urban settlement, and the economic geography of South Africa, with geographical skills. Each paper is 150 marks.

  • Map work

    Direction, scale, gradient, cross-section and a calculation from the map must show the formula and the substitution. A place you cannot point to on the extract is a guess.

  • How a marker reads it

    A common mix-up is to call a supermarket primary because it sells food, or a mine secondary because it uses machines.

Paragraph questions want causes and effects in sequence. Naming a term without saying how it changes the landscape or the settlement is only the first mark.

ABN

Diagram

Worked theory

Worked theory. A platinum mine in North West, a factory in Ekurhuleni, and a bank in Johannesburg. The mine is primary. The catalytic-converter plant is secondary. The bank that finances both is tertiary. A university lab designing a new process is quaternary. Close the factory and the mine may still export ore, but the country keeps less of the value, and the factory town loses jobs. That is why “we have minerals” is not the same sentence as “we have work”. The ore is the start of the chain, not the end.

More worked examples

  • One orange, three jobs

    An orange picked near Citrusdal is primary. The juice plant that bottles it is secondary. The supermarket in Cape Town and the truck between them are tertiary. A lab that breeds a seedless cultivar is quaternary. The shelf price is R15. The farmer may see R3. The gap is the chain, not a mystery tax. Export the fruit unprocessed and the R12 of later work is earned in another country.

  • Maize inland, sugar on the coast

    The maize belt on the Highveld and in the Free State grows a summer grain on rain and frost-tolerant timing. The KwaZulu-Natal coast grows sugar because it is hotter and wetter for longer. Both are primary. They are not interchangeable. Planting sugar on the Free State plateau fails the climate. A map of “farming” as one colour hides the two products and the two climates that decide them.

In ordinary words

Primary activity takes raw materials: farming, mining, fishing. Secondary activity makes them into goods: factories. Tertiary activity sells services: shops, transport, schools, clinics. Quaternary activity deals in information and research. South Africa mines and farms, manufactures less than it could, and sells services in the cities. A core region does the high-paid services. A periphery sends the raw materials and the migrant workers.

In South Africa

Platinum in North West, factories on the East Rand, and finance in Johannesburg are one chain.

Part 1 / 4

What it is

Economic geography is how a country makes a living: what it produces, where, and who gains.

Diagram

More worked examples

Board walkthroughs on this topic. Open one, copy the working, then try the next.

Example 1 / 20

Mining contributes about 6% of SA's GDP. If GDP is R7 000 bn, calculate mining's value.

How we got there

Read this like a teacher at the board. We go slowly, name every number, and say why we take each step.

Explain in another language · 11

1. What is the question asking?

Read the question twice. Circle the unknown. Underline every number and unit. The paper is asking: Mining contributes about 6% of SA's GDP. If GDP is R7 000 bn, calculate mining's value.

Before any working — hunt first

Given

Numbers and units already in the sentence: 6% · R7 · 000 bn. Copy each one into a column. A name without a number is not given.

Missing

After you copy the given, the letter that still has no number is missing. The paper is pointing at: mining's value. Circle that word — that is the missing variable.

Find

We are required to find: mining's value. Write that as a symbol on the left, with a question mark, before you touch a formula.

Calculate

What we need to calculate: Multiply. Then substitute the given, one line at a time, to get mining's value.

In other words — as if you have never seen this before

If you have never seen this before: Multiply. We will name a method in words, write the formula with no numbers, then substitute one line at a time.

2. What do we already know?

6% of R7 000 bn.

3. Which method — and why this one?

Multiply.

4. Step-by-step working

  1. 01 / 08

    Step A — Read the question twice

    Slow down. Circle the word that names the unknown. Underline every number and its unit. Do not grab a formula yet — first decide what the paper is actually asking.

    Why this step: If you can say the method in a sentence, you will pick the right formula. First-timers skip this and grab the first equation they remember.

  2. 02 / 08

    Step A2 — Hunt: Given, Missing, Find, Calculate

    Given: Numbers and units already in the sentence: 6% · R7 · 000 bn. Copy each one into a column. A name without a number is not given. Missing: After you copy the given, the letter that still has no number is missing. The paper is pointing at: mining's value. Circle that word — that is the missing variable. Find: We are required to find: mining's value. Write that as a symbol on the left, with a question mark, before you touch a formula. Calculate: What we need to calculate: Multiply. Then substitute the given, one line at a time, to get mining's value.

    Why this step: Do not name the letters yet. First hunt: what already has a number (Given), what has no number (Missing), the word the paper wants (Find), and which formula still contains the missing letter (Calculate).

  3. 03 / 08

    Step B — Write the given in a column

    6% of R7 000 bn.

    Why this step: A column with units stops you mixing cm with m, or minutes with seconds. Markers can also see you started correctly.

  4. 04 / 08

    Step C — Name the method in words

    Multiply.

    Why this step: If you can say the method in a sentence, you will pick the right formula. First-timers skip this and grab the first equation they remember.

  5. 05 / 08

    Multiply

    0,06×7 000=R420 bn.

    Why this step: We only do one job per line so a marker can follow the marks — and so you can find a slip without starting over.

  6. 06 / 08

    Step G — Sense-check the size

    Ask: is this the kind of number a Grade 10–12 paper would want? A speed of 3 000 ms for a learner walking, or a probability bigger than 1, means a unit or algebra slip. Estimate first: round the numbers and do the sum in your head.

    Why this step: Markers write ‘unrealistic’ in the margin when the method is right but the size is wild. A 10-second head check often finds a missing 10² or a unit that never changed.

  7. 07 / 08

    Step F — Box the answer with its unit

    R420 bn.

    Why this step: A number without a unit is half a mark on a Physics paper, and a marker can miss a Maths answer that is buried in working.

  8. 08 / 08

    Step H — What the marker is looking for

    On an NSC memo you usually earn: (1) a method mark for naming the right formula or idea in words, (2) an accuracy mark for substituting the given numbers with units, (3) an accuracy mark for the boxed answer with its unit. Write those three lines even if you are unsure of the arithmetic — blank pages score zero.

    Why this step: First-timers chase the final number and leave the method blank. The memo still pays out for the idea and the substitution even when the last line is wrong.

5. The answer

R420 bn.

Copy onto your answer sheet — in this order

Answer: R420 bn.

6. Check it like a marker

Mining also earns forex.

7. A trap first-timers fall into

First-timers often grab the first formula they remember, mix units (cm with m, minutes with seconds), or drop a minus sign. Write the formula in words first: “this equals that, because…”

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