Those of you who joined us last year may recall that I talked about heightened uncertainty complicating the conduct of monetary policy. If anything, the environment has become more complex for policymaking in both emerging and advanced economies, South Africa being no exception.
Let me start by reiterating the primary mandate of the South African Reserve Bank (SARB), which is to achieve and maintain price stability in the interest of balanced and sustainable economic growth. It should be noted that price stability is pursued within a flexible inflation targeting monetary policy framework, with the target band for headline consumer price inflation being 3 to 6 percent.