Covid PPE Manufacturing

5 minutes

Produced for CNN Marketplace Africa

Production lines silent… orders cancelled … it’s been a tough year for south African manufacturers. Prior to the covid-19 pandemic, manufacturing was already in decline, down from a high of 25 percent of the country’s GDP in the mid 1980’s to 12 percent in 2019. Then in March of 2020, the production of non-essential items came to a virtual standstill. For some companies the challenge sharpened their focus. For Johannesburg based manufacturer u-mask, adapting over the past few months has paid off.