The Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism (Deat) is reviewing another chapter of the National Environmental Management Act and the environmental impact-assessment (EIA) regulations, in an attempt to speed up South Africa’s slow EIA process, which has been blamed for holding back fixed investment in projects, Environmental Affairs and Tourism Minister said on Friday.

Martinus van Schalkwyk, who reported that government has slashed the backlog of applications submitted under the former EIA regulations by half, said that the amendment process would be concluded by the end of July and that both would be published for public comment by the end of this month.

He said that the Deat had processed 95% of the more than 1 500 EIAs that had been received since new regulations came into effect last July and that pending applications submitted under the 1997 regulations had been reduced from 5 995 applications at the end of June 2006 to less than 2 500 applications at the end of last month.

“Contracts to the amount of R11,3-million have been awarded to service providers to assist provincial authorities with the expeditious finalisation of the remaining applications,” Van Schalkwyk said.

Last July, the State said it was to engage the services of private consultants to assist, in particular, provincial governments, to clear the backlog of EIAs and Deat introduced a five-point action plan to expedite the processing of applications submitted under the former EIA regulations.

President Thabo Mbeki described the backlog as “quite frightening” and said that it was holding up fixed-investment projects across the country and that it was undermining economic growth and development.

Deat blamed a lack of financial and human resources capacity within provincial departments for the backlog. Deputy director-general for environmental quality and protection Joanne Yawitch told Engineering News previously that most provinces had experienced a decrease in budget for EIA processes over the last two years, which had resulted in a reduced financial capacity to acquire additional resources, but that the number of applications had been on the increase.

Van Schalkwyk, who was speaking at a seminar hosted by the Western Cape region of the South African Planning Institute, said that government was committed to making even further improvements to the EIA system, which would ensure that future economic growth occurs in a manner that did not compromise the integrity of the environment.

"Our experience in South Africa continues to prove that the interests of communities and the interests of the environment can never be separated. Economic development and investment on the one hand, and conservation on the other, need not be opposing end goals,” he said.

South Africa implemented EIA regulations in 1997, but feedback from authorities and stakeholders revealed a number of inadequacies in the regulations and the general EIA system. In reviewing the system, Deat concluded that a revised EIA system was required and introduced the second generation EIA Regulations, which constituted the first step towards a revised environmental-impact management system. This came into effect in July 2006.

Deat said that the 2006 regulations had, insofar as the enabling Act allowed, introduced various ways to streamline processes and reduce the need for EIAs where environmentally informed strategic spatial tools were in place.

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