Yesterday brought with it the news that we won’t be hosting any major sporting tournaments for a while – at least when it comes to rugby, cricket and netball.

Following Fikile Mbalula’s announcement statisticians started crunching the numbers, and according to the third Eminent Persons Group Transformation Status report released in Pretoria yesterday achieving representative sports teams might be easier than we think.

Here’s TimesLive with those findings:

Statistics SA figures show that the mortality rate among whites exceeded the birth rate in 2011. They also show that the white population could decline to 3 million by 2030 – from the present figure of over 4.5 million.

The report warns that this signals a diminishing resource.

It states: “Long-term sustainability from a human capital point of view needs to be addressed now by these codes because it is something that cannot and will not be resolved overnight.”

Willie Basson, a member of the group, said that currently 84% of the populace aged 18 and under was black, with whites, coloureds and Indians making up the remaining 16%.

He said: “Whites are the only population group that is declining and, if they continue to shape their future around the white population, then those sporting codes are in deep trouble.”

Somewhere Fikile is having a lovely little chuckle to himself.

[source:timeslive]

[imagesource:timeslive]