Cape Town - The Public Works and Infrastructure Department has gazetted a list of Strategic Integrated Projects (SIP) that are expected to be rolled out over the next few months.
Minister Patricia de Lille made the announcement on Monday and said the department was facilitating more than 270 upgrade projects.
“We put the projects through an assessment to see if they are bankable, ready for implementation and to determine which projects had feasibility studies done. To deal with the infrastructure backlog in our country, we are clear that the government cannot do it alone. Once we pulled all the infrastructure projects in the country together, the public and private sector worked together to see how we can improve on the implementation from the onset,” De Lille said.
In the transport sector, a total of 15 projects to the value of R47billion in investment value have been gazetted.
The potential for direct job creation in this sector is estimated at 50000.
In the human settlement sector, projects worth R138bn of investment have been gazetted, with the potential to create an estimated 190000 direct jobs. Collectively the water and sanitation projects are worth R106bn in investment spanning across all provinces with the potential for direct job creation estimated at about 25000.
Three projects from the energy sector have been gazetted, with total investment value of R58bn.
They have the potential to create an estimated 6000 direct jobs.
“Domestic access to this type of infrastructure will reduce South Africa’s reliance on other countries for the type of information that these satellites can make available and is expected to reduce the time frames for collecting necessary data. The agriculture and agro-processing sector has two projects gazetted worth R7bn in investment value with the potential to create an estimated 4000 jobs,” she said.
The 12 special projects have a specific aim to create jobs and assist in skills development as many vulnerable communities have been hardest hit by economic impact of Covid-19.
De Lille said the hardest hit sector had been construction. The industry contributed approximately R32bn to the Western Cape’s total gross value.
Western Cape Property Development Forum chairperson Deon Van Zyl said: “As the construction industry slowly reopens, we are both relieved on the one hand that business is restarting (albeit under a brand new world order), but at the same time we are starting to count the losses from which it will take an industry already heavily under pressure even before Covid-19, a long time to recover.”
Cape Argus