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Budget Speech 2018

Provincial and Local Government

Drought

 

Madam Speaker,

 

Severe drought conditions are affecting large parts of the country, and it is placing extreme strain on the supply of water to nearly 4 million people in the City of Cape Town.

 

Some smaller towns in Northern Cape, Eastern Cape including Nelson Mandela Bay and Western Cape are also facing water shortages.

 

South Africa is a water-scarce country, and our climate is changing in ways that make rainfall patterns far less predictable than in the past.

 

We need to conserve water.

 

We have among the highest levels of per capita daily domestic water consumption levels in the world, but also some of the highest levels of inequality in reliable access to water.

 

National government will continue to work with municipalities to respond effectively to the water crisis.

 

Government stands ready to provide financial assistance where necessary:

• A provisional allocation of R6 billion has been set aside in 2018/19 for several purposes, including drought relief and to augment public infrastructure investment.
• Government is concerned by the potential job losses in vulnerable farming communities as a result of the drought. We are therefore exploring the option of partially mitigating losses by temporarily increasing intake in the Working for Water programme.
• Allocation for drought response funds for water infrastructure projects and EPWP will be made in the Adjustment Budget
• To provide short term assistance, this budget includes disaster relief grants for provinces and municipalities worth R473 million in 2018/19. Other conditional grants can also be reprioritized to respond to disasters if necessary.