SA Cities Network Sustainable Cities Reference Group Meeting
Held on the 22nd August 2006 at Ekurhuleni
1. Introductory remarks - Seana Nkhahle, Programme Manager, SACN [PDF, 110kb]
The Sustainable Cities Reference Group of the SACN has been reconstituted to ensure that targeted participants are given the opportunity to:
Provide input to guide the SACN and its partners
Facilitate a common voice as cities engage with the national government (the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism (DEAT))
Exchange knowledge and information - best practices to enhance the cities' various activities.
Monitor and evaluate the member cities' activities.
All reference group meetings should produce knowledge resources that can be shared.
The Sustainable Cities Reference Group will meet three times in the next year to bring representatives from the following sectors and organisations together: environmental planning and management officials from the member cities, strategic and developmental planning (IDP) managers from the member cities, DEAT, DPLG, Salga, universities and research institutions, civil society institutions (such as ICLEI, and EcoCity), and international agencies who operate in this sector (including DANIDA).
The Sustainable Cities Reference Group will consider the following topics during in the year ahead:
The role of cities in implementing the National Strategy for Sustainable Development (NSSD);
The knowledge and lessons emerging from the SA-Denmark Urban Environmental Management Programme;
Leading practice in mainstreaming sustainability in city development strategies and integrated development planning.
This first meeting of the new Sustainable Cities Reference Group is intended to allow DEAT to engage the SACN member cities in a discussion about how to give effect to the NSSD.
2. NSSD presentation - Blessing Manale, DEAT [PDF, 56kb]
During the IDP hearings held by parliament it was agreed that all levels of government, in partnership with business and broad civil society should develop a shared sustainable development paradigm. DEAT has developed this shared paradigm and it is called the National sustainable Development Strategy (NSSD). Some of the critical questions have been:
how do we implement this paradigm within local government;
how do we consolidate the various initiatives and energies into a coherent framework;
how do we transcend the theory into implementation at a local level;
how do we ensure that everyone understands their roles within all of this;
how do we move away from just focusing on issues of compliance around sustainable development in our implementation.
It is hoped that during this meeting, participants can make progress towards answering these questions and finding this shared vision. Answers to these questions should form the basis of the cities' response to the NSSD.
The NSSD seeks to create a national vision for sustainable development and to provide the integration that has been missing in many other processes like NEMA and the RDP. The content development process happened over two years through discussions and engagement with various stakeholders. The document currently does not have an agreed mission and objectives due to tensions within government on areas of emphasis between economic growth and the need for environmental sustainability. The NSSD is determined to facilitate a shared sustainable development paradigm that acknowledges the importance of growing the economy and delivering services. These would be achieved well through finding a balance between the three pillars of sustainable development which include: economic development, social development and environmental protection. It also argues that appropriate governance and institutional systems are imperative to achieve this triple bottom line.
The NSSD is being developed in three phases. Phase 1 develops the background and overview of the strategy and seeks public comment on the general approach being taken. Incorporation of public comments is expected to be completed in September 2006 leading up to a presentation of the broad strategy to cabinet in November 2006. Phase 2 involves engaging with various sector departments in developing action plans which are expected to be implemented in collaboration between a wide range of stakeholders beyond. This phase should be concluded in March 2007. Phase 3 involves developing the implementation matrix and the first review of the whole strategy.
Questions, comments and discussion issues:
It was agreed that more extensive engagement with municipalities was required especially (but not limited to) defining roles and responsibilities before the strategy could be finalised and approved by cabinet. Cities still require more clarity on the role of cities in implementing the strategy at the local level and what support DEAT would provide in this regard. DEAT indicated that while the NSSD will still be presented to Cabinet in November 2006 the document will not be presented as a final document. Another consultative process with cities and district municipalities will be facilitated during Phase 2 (Action Plans)
It is not clear in the NSSD as to what role cities could play to help develop their rural adjacent counterparts or how the urban-rural interface will be dealt with. This is a critical interface that must be dealt with in collaboration between DEAT, SACN and SALGA. It was noted that SALGA must be more actively involved in the NSSD process to ensure that all municipalities are involved in the process.
It is critical for cities to acknowledge their footprint beyond their boundaries hence they must plan together with adjacent smaller towns and their rural hinterlands and to enter into partnerships with these in implementing the NSSD. Partnerships with business and civil society are critical in enhancing delivery. It is also noted that not much is said in the NSSD about the impact of state-owned enterprises and their role in facilitating sustainable cities. Particular reference was made to their assets and how these could be utilised to facilitate a more efficient urban system.
A regional approach with meaningful engagement between different stakeholders may help achieve some MDG objectives qualitatively and help move beyond mere compliance to regulatory frameworks towards broader more meaningful impacts. Provinces could help facilitate regional co-ordination even though participants were critical of their role.
South Africa has done well to meet the MDG target of providing access to clean water. However more work is still required to meet other targets. The NSSD must be used to enhance co-ordination between all spheres of government in efforts to meet these targets. A further call was made that this co-ordination must help avoid duplication amongst activities of the different spheres. This must be done at the planning stages of these activities.
3. Responses to the NSSD from the cities
Five cities presented their interpretation and sustainable urban development as well as their efforts in facilitating sustainable development within their cities. This demonstrated a wide range of interpretations and efforts that need to inform the guidance that could be provided by DEAT and the NSSD.
The first presentation was that of the City of Cape Town's Strategy for Sustainable Development by Waheed Patel in the office of the Executive Director [PDF, 1.9Mb]. The City of Cape Town has been very involved with international processes and they want to share this learning. The focus was on the built environment where the main objective is to improve the way buildings impact on the environment, with the recognition that there is a lack of knowledge on how building materials impact on the environment. The construction industry spends about US$4.2 trillion per year. It is also a huge consumer of energy accounting for 30-50% of all global energy and a third of all carbon emissions. The City of Cape Town has developed Green Building guidelines that include the solar water heating bylaw with tax incentives. Cape Town now has its own solar water heater targets and Renewable Energy targets. Energy is a key part of Cape Town's sustainability work and it has its own City Energy Strategy.
The second presentation was that of Ekurhuleni's Environmental Management Frameworks by Elizabeth Olivier [PDF, 6.3Mb]. It focused on the development of Environmental Management Frameworks (EMFs) that are critical for providing information for decision making. These EMFs were drafted in cooperation with the provincial government.
The third presentation, by Graeme Gotz was on the City of Johannesburg's Growth Development Strategy and 5 year IDP and how they entrench issues of the sustainable city in the strategies [PDF, 1Mb]. The presentation indicated how Johannesburg has incorporated sustainability and some principles of NSSD in their growth and development strategy, as well as IDP, thus mainstreaming sustainability in the city. The growth & development strategy is a package that includes the vision of the city, the paradigm development with 5 years objectives and an analysis of development trends and dynamics. The analysis looks at the local environmental resources and risks like global warming, Peak Oil demand, water shortages, storm water drainage, etc. The "Sustainability & environmental justice" principle is core of the strategy and anticipates the risk of global environmental issues, proactively manages local environmental resources and ensures that quality of life is not just limited to services but includes a range of human development processes.
The fourth presentation was that by Gaongalelwe Vivian Seekoe on Mangaung Municipality's Environmental Management System (EMS) [PDF, 606kb]. Their EMS follows the Plan-Do-Act-Check approach which is holistic and based on the ISO 14001 elements. The process followed is Analysis-Policy-Action Plans (Policy Planning Implementation approach). An example of this is an Urban Open Space policy that deals with the ecological, economic and social issues.
The fifth presentation was by Dawn McCarthy on Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality's Sustainable Communities [PDF, 7.4Mb]. The presentation focused on sustainable communities and implications for spatial planning. The city is integrating sustainability principles in their settlement planning process in response to a planning gap between spatial development frameworks and the IDPs. The process facilitates sustainability and local economic development in the settlements. The results of this process have been a generic reference tool that helps to define the priorities in communities. One of the key issues has been to reduce the need to travel within the city by bringing crucial socio-economic opportunities to the communities, e.g. schools, businesses, agriculture. They have crafted a framework that creates communities, where you can walk to schools, shops, libraries etc.
CONCLUSIONS
A similar thread of issues emerged in the presentations. The presentations indicated that a sustainability agenda has to be broader than just ecological issues and must take a multi-sectoral approach, for example, the built environment is an area where cities could have an influence in terms of consumption of natural resources. The challenge for the cities however, is how to put in place an appropriate governance structure and what strategies should be put in place to drive this sustainability agenda.
What came out of discussion is the following: that there is a need to facilitate a collaborative input into the NSSD with various cities. It is clear that cities are beginning to put action plans together that will be part of Phase 2 of the NSSD process, however, they need to have a clear agenda and mandate from national government (DEAT) as to what is expected from them in terms of the development and implementation of the NSSD. The two processes need to be streamlined to ensure that they complement each other. Cities have to also be clear in terms of what they expect out of the NSSD when making their inputs. To avoid duplication, inputs will be made directly to DEAT. If participants of the reference group still feel that they would like to have a discussion with each other before they make submissions to DEAT, SACN is open to that. It was noted however that NSSD process timelines need to be recognised.
DEAT could receive inputs from all the cities and municipalities and still make all of these inputs available to everyone so that they could see the inputs from other cities and smaller municipalities. DEAT will be issuing the strategy for comment and all organisations, including cities are welcome to submit comments.
The SACN is grateful to the Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Municipality for hosting this meeting.
Sharon Lewis, Knowledge Manager at the SACN, presented a brief overview of the SA-Denmark UEM programme and the role that the SACN will play in ensuring that the learning from this programme is shared with all the SACN member cities. (Presentation 8 Attached)
The 5 year SA-Denmark UEM programme was launched in July 2006 with a budget of 220 million DKK (approximately R272 million). It responds to international priorities for sustainable development, but is defined by the strategic and operational priorities of all of the programme partners. Partners implementing the programme are DEAT, Department of Health, provincial governments of Gauteng, KwaZulu Natal, and Western Cape, City of Cape Town, Johannesburg, eThekwini, Ekurhuleni, and Sedibeng.
SACN is also one of the implementing partners and will receive R1,2 million per year for the next 5 years to promote knowledge sharing between local government UEM programme partners and with a larger local government audience. Some of the knowledge products that will be produced include an introductory pamphlet on sustainable citiest, three meetings of the Sustainable Cities Reference group, an annual report on city performance in terms of sustainability and urban environmental management, an improved website, a quarterly communiqué and a coaching programme for city managers on issues relating to sustainable urban development.
Presentation for Seminar
