Millennium Development Goals implementation: contribution of Economic Sectors and Employment Cluster

Meeting report

Normal 0 Department of Rural Development and Land Reform (DRDLF) briefing
Ms Busi Mdaka, Executive Manager Cluster Co-ordinator: Department of Rural Development and Land Reform, explained the linkage between the Economic Sector and Employment Cluster Programme of Action, and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The goals, targets and indicators of each of the MDGs were outlined and the progress made towards the achievements of each of the MDGs was reported on. The cross cutting activities and programmes implemented by other clusters was outlined. With regard to food security, sustainable agrarian reform was highlighted as critical to improving the productivity, economic viability and sustainability of small and large farm enterprises. 5 215 jobs had been created in land reform projects. South Africa had increased the real wages of workers covered by sectoral determinations during the 2001 to 2010 period, particularly the wages of domestic and farm workers. 52853 women had been assisted to access employment services interventions. There was a need to measure the direct impact of each cluster programme towards the achievement of the MDGs (see document).

Discussion
Mr A Williams (ANC) asked for clarity about the statistics provided because most of them were from the years 2007 and 2008. The figures provided an idea of what had happened in the past. It would be preferable if when the Department visited again, it provided the Committee with more recent figures.

Ms Thandeka Zungu, Department of Energy Deputy-Director General: Chief Operations Officer, said that one of the challenges her Department faced was that of annual reporting. This was particularly the case when statistics/data was received from municipalities. For example when looking for employment figures one of the challenges was what defined a job. This was because a situation often arose where employment figures were inflated when persons did more than one job for example where electrification was concerned. One person would do work in more than one village and this would documented as different people doing this job, and as separate jobs.

Mr Williams said that the slide on job creation (slide 15) reflected job creation with regard to women and disabled. It seemed that the results in South Africa were much lower than the targets, and when it came to men, they were taking all the jobs. He asked what was happening to correct the situation, especially with regard to women and disabled persons.

Ms Zungu replied that the issue of job creation in the area of women and disabled persons was a challenge. Most progress was made with the electrification programme where attempts were made to address this challenge. The Department did rely on municipalities for this, where agreements where entered into with municipalities.

Mr Williams noted that the information about job losses as provided on slide 17 showed that the most vulnerable persons were still losing their livelihoods. This should be highlighted as a very serious problem. Assuming that the trends from 2007 and 2008 were still like this, there was a need to look seriously at how they were going to deal with this.

Mr Ricardo Hansby, Deputy Director-General of Infrastructure and Economic Developments, replied that the Department had certain targets, and also worked with the statistics. The Department, together with sectoral departments, was looking at norms and standards for basic services. With the little that they had, they wanted to upscale certain programmes, to challenge the statistics, but also the quality of services delivered. There were a number of challenges with delivery especially to rural communities. Technical solutions must be explored as a country, such as rural water schemes as the expensive technology was not always required.

Ms A Steyn (DA) said that she was also questioning the information and what was outstanding. The direct achievements had not yet been measured. She asked when these would be measured. There had to be an indication of a baseline from whence measurements could be made. With regard to the information provided about the decrease in poverty, how could it be done and by how much could it be decreased?

Ms Zungu said that what was needed in the cluster was to look at the statistics and an approach to the presentation thereof. There was an abundance of coal in the country. Most of the money was for infrastructural work done. The Department was planning, in co-operation with Eskom and other power generating companies, to look at how best coal could be cleaned. The Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) was recently approved by Cabinet. The IRP was an attempt to address the imbalances in resource usage and the supply of energy. This was a 20 year plan and the outcomes promised to be more tangible in the long term.

Ms Mohale asked for clarity about issues of technology like cell phones, landlines and ‘googling’ information as she failed to understand how these could be used adequately if people did not have the necessary technology.

Mr Bandile Hadebe, Director: Planning and Foresight in the Department of Communications, replied that the Progress Report submitted by the Department of Communications was dictated to by the process undertaken by STATSA, who is actually the driver for reporting on the MDGs. The Department was given strict measures as to how to report with regard to Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) as guided by the Information and Communications University (ICU) framework for reporting on telecommunications. The figures presented in the document were therefore guided by this approach.

Mr Hadebe said that a more comprehensive report called The Barometer was released by the Department two weeks ago. This report actually provided a deeper analysis of the different sectors. Nine sectors had been measured across the country looking at the penetration of ICTs into education, health, households, individuals and government services. The Department had therefore looked into where it stood in relation to information technology as an enabler for development. The process going forward was based on the findings that had emerged. The gaps have been identified. The issue about availability of ICTs could not be ignored. Processes had been put in place to deal with the challenges especially in the rural areas where the Department had drafted a strategy on how to roll out ICT in rural areas.

An ANC Committee Member asked the Department of Rural Development and Land Reform what it did in communities.

Mr Vusi Mahlangu, DRDLR Deputy-Director General: Corporate Services and Acting CFO, replied that the Department had extended recapitalisation and development to communities through the former irrigation schemes. In order to improve the lives of people, seven provinces had been identified to partake in the initiative on irrigation schemes. The Department also complemented what other departments were doing, but contributed mainly with regard to land reform as this was its core mandate. The Department had come up with a re-capitalisation and development strategy that talked to all farms acquired by the government since 1994. This was to ensure that there was production and food security in all of those farms and to allow issues of jobs and income generation to be addressed.

Mr Mahlangu said that most of the answers to questions would be provided in the Land Reform Green Paper which was submitted to Cabinet last week. There was the hope that all South Africans would feel free to contribute to this process.

The Acting Chairperson said that, with regard to statistics, South Africa had to be viewed holistically as this would allow understanding to be developed through movement from the known to the unknown. The pace at which the government moved was very slow.

Ms Zungu said that the issue of the Carbon Dioxide figures in the presentation would be taken back to the Department which would definitely have some contribution to make in this regard.

Mr C Msimang (IFP) said that the presentation had generalisations and was vague; hence it failed to get to the core of the problem. He asked what kind of assistance women and youth on farms were getting as this was mentioned in the report. There was a substantial exodus from rural to urban areas, so if they were getting assistance he wanted to know what kind of assistance they were getting and what kind of jobs they did.

Mr Vusi Mahlangu said that the Department was providing assistance through co-ordination and facilitation work in close co-operation with other departments.

Ms Mdada replied that this was the first time that the Department of Rural Development and Land Reform had reported as per each cluster on the MDGs and benefits. There was a need to re-look at how plans were implemented.

Ms Mohale asked what relationship the departments present had with different municipalities.

Mr Hansby replied that with regard to municipalities, it should be noted that the core business of the Department of Cooperative Governance was to support local government.

Mr Hansby said that there was a lot of pressure on municipalities for reports. This pressure did sometimes allow for the presentation of ‘glossy’ reports, which detracted from the reality. The footprint of the government through municipalities was vast, but the system of reporting had to corrected.

Mr Bandile Hadebe, Department of Communications, replied that the Department of Communications was a national department, and did liaise with municipalities. It had a unit that focused specifically on intergovernmental relations, and liaised with provinces and municipalities on implementation. Projects were implemented within municipalities and provinces and in partnership with both groupings.

Ms Mohale asked if the departments referred to Integrated Development Plans (IDPs) to check if they reflected what people wanted.

Mr Hansby replied that local government was supported with the development of IDPs and an attempt was made to try to link what was happening at the local level with provincial plans, and then with the national plan. There was also a move by the National Planning Commission to ensure that through their department, the quality of IDPs were improved. There was a need to intervene drastically and this point was well taken.

Mr Hadebe, Department of Communications, replied that the Department worked with municipalities when they were in process of developing their IDPs, or when they had already completed their IDPs. If they had completed their IDPs the Department would assist them with a plan to implement the IDP efficiently, and with the platforms that were provided through ICTs. The Department could then influence the projects that were completed or flowed from the IDPs with certain imperatives that were coming from the National Department with regard to ICTs.

Mr Mahlangu replied that the Department of Rural Development and Land Reform worked with IDPs through a local council which consisted of chiefs and the community. The Department also assisted through co-ordination and facilitation especially where local municipalities and other departments could not meet their needs.

Ms Mohale noted that she had seen an improvement in the provision of electrification through Eskom.

Ms Mohale asked what was happening with regard to landlines.

Mr Hadebe said that the Department of Communications was fundamentally a policy branch and therefore provided the model of how ICT was supposed to be driven in the country. The ICT sites were mainly driven by the private sector. There were more mobile companies than landline phone companies in the country, and therefore from a business perspective with people who were focussed on the bottom line, they struggled to see the value of rolling out fixed lines when everyone had cellular phones. It was recognised that the cost of landlines were far cheaper than cellular phones, and if this agenda was pushed it could have an impact on communicatons in the country.

Mr Msimang commented that a distinction should be made between statistics and realities, as people normally got excited when they saw reports, but needed to go to the areas concerned to see the realities. The need for sustainability had to be addressed by all officials. Communities bought farms but had no money for equipment, so farms were left to waste. Clinics were not adequately resourced, and there were problems with water access and supply. When one spoke about service delivery one should also speak about sustainability. The jobs that were labour intensive contradicted the trends regarding ICT. ICT should be viewed alongside the development of economic trends.

Mr Hadebe said that with regard to job creation and primary industries versus global progression towards a knowledge based economy, there was agreement that South Africa would continue to provide more jobs from primary industries, and there was agreement that the coal industry could promote more jobs. However, with this focus, we should not lose sight of how the world progressed and how our global competitive edge could be maintained.

Ms Steyn expressed concerns about a recent oversight visit where it was found that the resources provided were highly inadequate. The clinics were smaller in size than Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) houses. What was read in the reports and what was seen on site was totally different. We were not addressing the needs of the community.

Mr Mahlangu said that the issue of clinics was about norms and standards and how these were dealt with in different situations.

Ms Steyn said that the targets set for achievements of the Department last year were cut by 50% because the strategy was now based on an outcomes based delivery approach. Targets should be linked to MDGs. This required knowing for example how many households had to be targeted in the country. We have to re-look at what we were setting goals for.

Ms Steyn said that the Department was using household profiling as an approach at the Comprehensive Rural Development Programme Framework (CRDP) sites. She asked if this was linked to outcomes based performance, and if this information was shared with other departments because it was supposed to influence the thinking of what was required at CRDP sights.

Mr Hansby, Department of Cooperative Governance, replied that a problem existed as there was a disjuncture between the outcomes based approach - where ministers had signed delivery agreements - and the Millennium Development Goals. Although there was a close synergy in practice, on paper it was very difficult to reconcile the two when it came to reporting. There was a need to engage with the Presidency and the Department of Performance Monitoring and Evaluation, as the unit responsible for reporting for the country in general. There was a need for a custodian of reporting on the MDGs, who could deal with the integration into outcomes based reporting. The Department did not separate out information all time.

Mr Hansby said that there was also the issue of who was the custodian of statistics in the country. The official position was that it was Statistics South Africa. Unfortunately they could not collect statistics on everything hence there was unreliability especially with regard to information on the progress made within sectors.

Mr Mahlangu replied that the Department needed the information from the household profiling research before it could do anything in any local municipality. This information was shared with local branches and other departments.

The Acting Chairperson said that publicity was required on the milestones and challenges of the Department so that the community could be made aware of the situation.

The following questions were raised
Ms M Mohale (ANC) said that slide 19 which provided statistics for Millennium Development Goal (MDG) three, which was: On promoting gender equality and empowering women, it states that women were assisted. What was the assistance, how did women benefit and what was the training all about? She did not see how the ‘layoffs’ indicated were incorporated with rest of the data there.

Ms Mohale asked how job losses could be accounted for especially when some of the persons involved were not in the country legally.

Some important points that emerged were

Mr Hansby said that officials need to be located at grassroots level. They were trapped in Pretoria thinking that they knew what was happening at grassroots level. They should be able to go into the field to gain a thorough knowledge of the terrain; then targets, norms and quality of service required could be properly addressed.

Ms H van Schalkwyk (DA) said that if extreme poverty had to be eradicated, the importance of basic education and skills training and development could not be highlighted enough.

The meeting was adjourned.