South Africa Says Flood Death Toll Rises to 40

Bloomberg/businessweek, by Mike Cohen, January 17, 2011

Jan. 17 (Bloomberg) -- South Africa’s government said the death toll from widespread flooding has risen to 40 and that the army, police and disaster management services remain on full alert.

“The toll is unlikely to rise further,” Vuyelwa Qinga, a spokeswoman for the Department for Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, said in a telephone interview from a game lodge in the northern Limpopo province today. “The situation is stabilizing.”

Heavy rains have delayed trains, interrupting deliveries of coal from mines operated by Xstrata Plc, the biggest thermal coal exporter, and BHP Billiton Ltd. to South Africa’s Richards Bay Coal Terminal. About 20,000 hectares (49,200 acres) of agricultural land have been swamped, the Johannesburg-based South African Press Association cited Agriculture Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson as saying.

The government is due to hold a press briefing at 1:30 p.m. local time, when it will probably declare some of the flood- affected areas disaster zones.

The floods have hit the Gauteng region, which includes Johannesburg and the capital, Pretoria, the Northern Province, KwaZulu-Natal, the Limpopo province. In December, most of the country had more than double the normal volume of rain for the month, according to data on the South African Weather Service website.

The full extent of the damage is still being assessed, Qinga said.

--Editors: Philip Sanders, Heather Langan

To contact the reporter on this story: Mike Cohen in Cape Town at mcohen21@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Philip Sanders in London at psanders@bloomberg.net.