It has been a good week for the Men in Black, with the Competition Appeals Court approving the Walmart merger, and the necessary authorities giving the nod to the Namibian wing of the transaction. On the less arid side of the border, back here in the RS of A, Judge Dennis Davis approved the merger on the condition that government, the merging parties and labour all sit down together to conduct a study on the impact of the merger in supplier jobs and that the parties examine the ways in which small suppliers can participate in Walmart’s global supply chain. The court will then formulate the appropriate structure for the supplier development fund – effectively overturning the Competition Tribunal’s stipulation of a R100million fund.

Comment: Massmart seem pleased, and so, interestingly, do international troublemakers UNI Global Union, who have been towelling Cosatu down in the red corner.

Bytes Managed Solutions has scored big by winning a tender from Pick n Pay to “refresh” the existing point-of-sale (POS) hardware infrastructure at all Pick n Pay stores over a two-year period, POS hardware infrastructure, naturally, being cash registers. This involves the replacement of machinery in 8,000 lanes nationally, with some 4,500 having already been completed and the rest due by the end of the year. The exercise is not simply a question of replacing the twelve-year-old system in place, but providing customers with a better experience and giving the business additional functionality, flexibility and support. The technology, acquired as it so often is from NCR, will use less energy and increase the productivity at the tillpoint.

Comment: But no mention as yet of self-checkout, which in our experience involves one customer, a clever machine thingy, and three staff members to stand around saying “you’re doing it wrong.”

Weighing in on the Walmart discussion in Namibia last week were some of the country’s smaller retailers – and surprisingly, the target of their ire was not Walmart or Massmart, but the Namibian government, which, they feel, has offered them insufficient protection from other international retailers, namely our very own Shoprite, Pick n Pay and SPAR. The march of the majors has played merry hell with the little guy, apparently, with four chains – Punyu, Continental, Elago and Black – having gone out of business since the 90s, and others like Okalindi shrinking dramatically, having gone from 10 stores in Windhoek to just three. The issue, according to Chris Siririka, National Coordinator at the Indigenous People’s Business Forum (IPBF) is simply purchasing power. This has led the IPBF to look into a group purchasing scheme for retailers, and the government to consider an amendment to the Foreign Investment Act.

Comment: Anti-freemarket protectionism? Or the legitimate encouragement of the diversity which when nurtured can be a powerful engine for sustainable economic growth?

SABMiller is the Otto von Bismarck of the world of international beveragecy, taking over this, declaring war on that and constructing around itself a vast web of incomprehensible alliances and partnerships in the far-flung reaches of the continents, building a ring of steel from which it will, one day, assail that coveted number one spot. This week, we are told, the transfer has been effected of SABMiller’s Ukrainian and Russian beer businesses in the transaction with Turkey’s Anadolu Efes that will conclude the strategic alliance of the two businesses for an assault on the thirsty citizens of Turkey, Russia, the CIS, Central Asia and the Middle East. SABMiller now owns 24% of Anadolu’s shares on the Istanbul Stock Exchange.

Comment: Next week: SAB plan to marry their great niece off to Archduke Franz-Ferdinand’s grandson.

Nestlé has announced a groundbreaking new partnership with the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research to look into indigenous South African biodiversity – that’s plants, to you – to evaluate the potential for nutraceutical and functional foods with proven health benefits. Foods, for eg, like those derived from hoodia, the near-mystical plant which reading between the lines has been keeping the San people skinny for thousands of years. Well that, good genes and a sparse diet of venison and roots, obviously. Nestlé will bring its technological expertise in the field of nutraceuticals to the CSIR and help the propeller-heads there understand industry development cycles and what it takes to commercialise an indigenous shrub with potential in its roots and a dream in its heart. The development of any actual product will naturally take place here in the motherland.

Comment: Awesome work, that global food giant. You too, geeks.

Last week, Allan Gray (that’s a business, not a person) bought 6% of Pioneer, for a cool R750million. Fair enough, that’s one of the things, as we understand it, that asset management businesses do on behalf of their clients. But here’s the question: who sold him, or rather them, or even it, those shares? Certainly not Kaap Agri Voedsel – Pioneer stock is its only asset and presumably its current raison d’être. Overberg Agri, then? Or even, we venture to suggest, Moorreesburg Koringboere? Overberg is holding something of a smoking gun, having sold 8.4million of its Pioneer shares just last month and now burdened with an inconvenient tax liability from the proceeds.

Comment: Intriguing stuff, whichever way you look at it, and setting the Platteland a figurative blaze with speculation as we speak.

We all know when the punters like to shop. Saturday mornings, obviously. The 24th of December. And pretty much every day in between. But when do they plan to shop? This was the question the clever folk over at TNS sought to answer in their Roots survey, and the answers were telling. To start with, most people are shopping during the weekend – 65% of them, in fact. A whopping 90% of people are doing some sort of planning before a shop, and 65% of them are planning their food and grocery shop in detail, which is commendable, and is borne out by a 2011 Google study which showed that 40% of people think about all of their purchases, both spontaneous and planned, one to three days before hitting the store. This means that the optimal time for communicating promotions to eager punters would be Wednesday / Thursday.

Comment: And flies in the face, somewhat, of that oft-stated old chestnut “90% of all decisions are made at the shelf.”

Coca-Cola has decided to keep buying oranges for use in Fanta from farmers in Rosarno in Calabria after resolving a dispute over the working conditions of migrant labourers in the region. The real news, of course, being that Fanta has actual oranges in it.

P&G South Africa have announced that they will be sponsoring the South African Olympic Team for the London 2012 Olympic Games as well as supporting youth sports development on an ongoing basis. This arrangement with the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (SASCOC) ties in with P&G’s international ten year commitment to the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

Fitness Magazine has reported sales of, on average, 19% higher for the fourth quarter of 2011 year-on-year, a fact it attributes to its decision to go into 30 top Woolworths stores, where the posher readership it prefers is to be found.