Business Unity SA (Busa) is hoping for a rate cut in January, it said on Tuesday.

This followed the earlier decision of the Monetary Policy Committee of the SA Reserve Bank to leave rates unchanged.

"Not unexpectedly, the repo rate has been left unchanged.

"As Busa would like to see the lowest possible interest rates consistent with control of inflation to get the SA economy moving again, it had hoped that a further cut of 50 basis points might have been possible at present," it added.

It said although it understood the reasons for a cautious monetary policy, the Reserve Bank had been unable for the past three MPC meetings to lower interest rates further.

Busa added that the real cost of borrowing for business remained high and helped to explain why the recovery from the recession was slow.

"Busa endorses the warning about the impact of excessively higher Eskom tariffs, which is likely to lead to less output and employment ? given overall demand weakness.

"The strong rand has also made it more difficult for business to compete either locally or abroad."

Busa said that while an economic recovery in South Africa did not depend solely on monetary policy, it hoped that the SARB would find more room to manoeuvre at the next meeting of the MPC in January 2010.