About us

The Department of Economics at the University of South Africa (Unisa) is the largest Economics Department in South Africa. The Department enrols approximately 30 000 students per semester, taught by more than 40 members of staff who are experts in distance education, some with over 30 years of teaching experience. Economics is one of the core disciplines in all BCom and several BA degrees. The department offers undergraduate, honours and postgraduate programmes. Please feel free to contact us about any academic related enquiries. However, please direct all administrative queries to the relevant administrative department.

Welcome message from the Chair of the Department

Prof Jabu Mkhize, CoD (Economics)

As the Department of Economics, we are cognisant of a changing world and resultant demands and expectations on and of graduates in the workplace, and hence we consistently review our degree curriculum. The intention of such review is to effectively prepare our students for the demands of the workplace.

The Department offers a wide range of study units, each specialising in a particular field of study. First level modules aim to typically gain insight into how the basic economic problem is solved in different economic systems; how economic activity is measured; and how prices are determined through decisions made by individual households and firms under conditions of perfect and imperfect competition.  Furthermore, first level modules aim to gain insight into macroeconomic theory and variables such as total production and income of a country, economic growth, unemployment, inflation, and the balance of payments.  Second level modules, in turn, focus on Microeconomics and Macroeconomics, Labour Economics, South African Economic Indicators, Environmental Economics, the South African Financial System, and Economics of Tourism.  The third and fourth level modules prepares our students for the study of specialised fields such as Monetary Economics, International Trade, International Finance, Development Economics, Public Economics, Economic Policy in South Africa, History of Economic Thought and Econometric Techniques.

Our Masters and PhD programmes will allow you an opportunity to join an active community of researchers who specialise in various fields and have undertaken prominent research projects.

In line with the Unisa’s open, distance, and e-learning (ODeL) model all our economics degrees are offered using available educational and social technologies that enhance the quality of teaching and learning. Our channels of delivery include print media as well as digital and multimedia technologies with interactive possibilities. We view the use of digital and multimedia approach as more effective than a single medium in facilitating the interaction and discussions between students, tutors and lecturers within the Open Distance Learning environment. This is one of our key strengths.       

Given the ever-changing global developments and sensitivity to the traces of the fourth industrial revolution, we recognise the need to teaching economics that is reflective of the current economic situation while preparing our students for employability.