SECTION I 7.21.1.14 Policy
3.9 DURBAN METROPOLITAN AREA AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Metropolitan areas are large urban settlements with high population densities, complex and diversified economies, and a high degree of functional integration across a large geographical area than the normal jurisdiction of a municipality (Local Government:
White Paper 1998:78).
Durban has been declared a metropolitan area, meanmg that it has a Category A municipality. The Durban Metropolitan Council is part of Local Government, and both have similar responsibilities and challenges. These include the need to (Local Government: White Paper 1998:89):
• Build appropriate municipal institutions in areas which have no existing administrative capacity, which are unlikely to attract strong local government personnel, and which have little or no financial base to support staff complements and sustain service delivery;
• Respond creatively to changes m local economies. This includes kick-starting development in areas where economic potential has not been realised, partly because of the high production and distribution costs imposed by poor municipal
infrastructure; initiatives to manage decline in many market towns and some regional service centres; and measures to anticipate and manage the effects of rapid growth in others;
• Anticipate shifts in settlement patters, especially with a large number of people leaving farmland, and with informal settlements rapidly growing on vacant land in agricultural areas and on the edges of towns;
• Provide for the basic needs of people living in historically derived settlement patterns, which are difficult and costly to serve. These include settlements on communally owned land where dispersed homesteads are the norm, and in denser areas of
'displayed urbanisation' on the borders of homelands; and
• Rapidly build capacity so that municipalities can respond to new opportunities, including the availability of national funding for infrastructure investment, the devolution of national and provincial functions, and a range of sectoral and spatial initiatives.
Some of these challenges and responsibilities can only be dealt with at the local level, and require strong and effective primary-tier local government. Other challenges play themselves out on a larger scale, and clearly demand regional attention through some form of cross-municipal authority.
According to the Local Government Transitional Act (LGTA) 209 (Act 1993) the metropolitan areas were defined by the following characteristics:
(i) Comprise the area of jurisdiction of multiple local government;
(ii) Densely populated with an intense movement of people, goods and services within the area;
(iii) Extremely developed or urbanised with more than one central district, industrialised area and concentration of employment, and forms a functional unit the comprising various smaller units, which are interdependent economically and respect of services.
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3.9.1 Local Government Activities with Direct Economic Impact
Local government in the DMA has had a major impact on the development of the local economy through the exercising of a wide range of functions. However, this impact has not been clearly recognised and assessed in terms of their economic impact. Since there has been very little in terms of explicit local government economic programmes, the functions that had an impact can be categorised into four main areas.
• Planner- In the past planning occurred within the framework of racial policy, which made coherent planning impossible across the different racially structured local government systems in the DMA. Planning within the white urban core was inhibited by the existence of different local authorities. Planning was informed by the principle of land use zoning and the ideal of suburban residential development based on apartheid residential patterns. Generally, planning was reactive and control orientated.
• Regulator-Local government has traditionally exercised a wide range of functions as watchdog or custodian of public interest, many of which impact directly or indirectly on the economy. This function is performed through the application or regulations and by-laws designed to secure public health and safely, standards of building, infrastructure and services and the environmental protection. Many of these controls are applied through zoning regulations, which govern the types of activity allowed in different areas such as industrial, commercial and residential areas.
• Employer and consumer-Local government has played a major role as employers and consumers in the DMA. The scale and nature of local government as an economic actor means that the way in which the city has been managed as an economic entity can have a major impact on the economy of the urban area.
• Service provider- Local government has traditionally engaged in basic service provision (electricity, waste and water), However, within the DMA this role has also
involved other services such as those of Durban City's Informal Trade and Small Business Department in facilitating street trading activities, and the tourist marketing efforts of Tourism Durban. (Economic Development Rapid-Action Programme 1996: 17).
3.9.2 Evaluating Durban Local Government's Impact on Local Economic Development
In broader terms, the strength of local government lies in the concentration of financial, institutional, technical and managerial resources within the core of the DMA. In some areas major development activities have been designed to build on the comparative advantages of the local economy. The prime example of this is the beachfront development undertaken by the Durban City Council to enhance the tourist potential of the city. Both Durban and Pinetown have been successful in facilitating the range of property developments in their areas. In Pinetown success has been achieved in attracting new industrial investment through the provision of effective services and offering of incentives to potential investors. These are the major strengths.
The major weakness in local governments' performance of their economic functions lie in the failure to plan economic interventions within a coherent policy framework, the failure to address infrastructural and service needs on the metropolitan peripheries and the overly bureaucratic application of planning criteria and regulations. In general the way in which local government has functioned has not been guided by clear policy with respect to the economic system and its sustainability. (Economic Development Rapid-Action Programme, 1996: 17).
Furthermore, local government did little to address distribution issues. Beyond limited charity work, provision of some services such as health etc, local government did not see a role for itself in working to address problems of poverty in the DMA.
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The key institutional weaknesses were, and remain, the lack of an economic policy capacity and the lack of institutional mechanisms to enable co-ordination between different service departments. The numerous agencies and institutions which undertook activities with economic impacts did so in isolation from one another. This prevented local government from responding rapidly and effectively to changing pressures on the economy (Economic Development Rapid-Action 1996: 17).
In addition, the continuing concentration of powers over key local economic activities in provincial and central government departments remains a barrier to local economic development co-ordination. Prime examples are the control of the port and airport being in the hands of national government and their lack of proper integration into the local economy. Furthermore, the performance of local government was inhibited by a failure to explicitly recognise the economic development impact of local government actions and by the reliance on bureaucratic forms of control to regulate economic activities (Economic Development Rapid-Action Programme 1996:19).
3.9.3 Current Development
The mission of the Economic Development Department (EDD) is to advise and guide the Durban Metropolitan Council on how it should act to promote economic development, job creation and redistribution in the Durban Metropolitan Area.
The following core competencies represented within the EDD illustrate the wide range of LED activities undertaken by the Department:
• negotiation and facilitation skills for improving the management of economic development projects and activities within the municipal government;
• policy and strategy formulation skills in the areas of private sector development, investment promotion, SMME development, the support of economic activities in low income areas, and tourism promotion;
• implementation skills in the areas of investment promotion and marketing, procurement and tender reform, creating effective development institutions and monitoring their performance;
• economic information collection and collation;
• design and management of in-depth economic development research projects;
• advanced data analysis and report writing; and
• communication and advisory skills.
The Department uses a project-based management format. It is organised into a Private Sector Development Unit, an SMME Development Unit, a Community Economic Development Unit, a Tourism Unit, and an Economic Research and Information Unit.
Recent achievement and development of the Economic Development Department include (Local Economic Development Manual Series 115 1998:11):
• the facilitation of the Durban Convention Centre development;
• establishing a 'Best Practice Commission' which investigated the city's planning and approval procedures;
• building a partnership with other stakeholders to develop an innovative beach management plan;
• assist the Metropolitan Local Business Service Centre;
• guiding the allocation of a R5 million fund to SMME development projects;
• managing a large census survey of street traders in the city;
• conducting a study of 100 manufacturing firms in the Southern Industrial Basin, and
• initiating research into urban agricultural opportunities.
There are also many projects which still need to be implemented, the Durban Waterfront Development is one of them. The Point Development which is already in place.
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