Programme Director
Honourable: MEC for Agriculture, Rural Development and Land Administration, Mme Candith Mashego Dlamini
Honourable MEC for Environmental Affairs, Ntate Mike Mokoena
Honourable District Executive Mayor,
Honourable Mayor of Mbombela Local Municipality and Councilors present
Distinguished Guests Comrades, Ladies and Gentlemen
I am gratified by the opportunity given to me to address you on the day of the opening of Working on fire academy. As you might have heard this morning on SABC2’s Morning Live, we are also here to celebrate the graduation of young men and women who went through this intensive program of fire fighting.
Programme Director, as the department we find this Program relevant especially since the findings of Forestry South Africa that suggests that the R3.6 billion damage to the Forestry Industry through major fires in August 2008 could have doubled had it not been for the Working on Fire partnership.
Ladies and gentlemen, the Working on Fire Programme part of our response as the environment sector to the government’s Extended Public Works Programme under the Department of Environmental Affairs.
Our various “Working for ...” programmes that are linked to the Expanded Public Works Programmes are rightfully well known for their ability to give the resources and dignity of work to previously unemployed people, and with a strong focus on the most marginalised (by race, gender, age and disability), particularly in rural areas.
What needs to be emphasised, however, is that this work leads to vital benefits for life and livelihoods. This Programme, Working on Fire forms part of these ‘‘Working for …’’ programmes.
This Programme was established in 2003 as part of our initiative to create jobs, to alleviate poverty, to skill previously unemployed youth and to contribute to South Africa’s integrated fire management capacity. In August of this year, the Programme was the recipient of the Kamoso Award, under the sector Environment and Culture, for best performing EPWP programme. This prestigious award is testimony to the success of the programme in achieving the above-mentioned objectives.
With interventions like this, we do not just create jobs for the sake of it, but also use such opportunities to enhance the capacity of the environment to sustain life and livelihoods. Whilst the focus of Working on Fire is on fire management, its underlying motivation is poverty relief and skills development that is designed to help beneficiaries build self-esteem and fulfil their true potential.
With this programme Ladies and Gentlemen, we address the prevention and control of wild-land fires and enhance the sustainability and protection of life, property and the environment through the implementation of Integrated Fire Management practices. Scientists tell us that climate change will cause further increases in the intensity and frequency of fires, as well as changes in seasonality.
Climate Change increases our temperatures and with that increased drought frequencies that combine to exacerbate the incidence of fire risk. The WoF programme will continue to play a crucial role in militating against this fire risk as well as playing a key role in rolling out fire awareness education campaigns across South Africa. Critically, the key focus will be on highlighting the fact that thousands of beneficiaries are employed by the programme.
Under these anticipated conditions of climate change, temperatures over parts of the interior of South Africa are projected to rise significantly over the next few decades. The eastern parts of South Africa are expected to experience summers with more intense rainfall events, while drier winters are projected for the south-western parts of South Africa. Notwithstanding the possibility of more intense rainfall events during summer, dry spells of relatively long duration may be expected to occur more frequently during all seasons.
Programme Director, as we anticipate these changes we must create awareness about the dramatic transformation which this programme has brought and continues to brings in the lives of the beneficiaries and their families.
The programme has three fundamental objectives which it has excelled on year after year, namely: Poverty Relief, Skills Development and Contribution to South Africa’s integrated fire management capacity.
Allow me to say this to our Men and Women fire fighters, Bo Mama na Botata you are not just heroes and heroines of fighting the spread of wild fires, but you are also fighting to save human lives, plants and animals. We applaud you for your hard work and bravery in dangerous situations, all in the interest of serving your beloved country. Bo mama na Botata, we must say, we are very proud of you.
As I mentioned in my budget speech earlier this year, our department is busy transforming our industries towards the building of a green economy that will enable us to create new labour absorbing industries that will mitigate impacts on the environment.
Ladies and gentlemen, Working on Fire is one such Program that is earmarked to make us reach those goals in less than two years.
These will be supported by various other programmes that we are rolling out such as the National Waste Management Strategy, the Environmental programmes linked to the Expanded Public Works Programme and many others.
There are more than 5 000 beneficiaries currently in the programme, 85% of whom are youth members, and 33% are women (the highest level of women in any comparable fire service in the world).
On average, some 54% of government funds are spent on wages, with an additional 24% spent on indirect employee costs (training, PPE, transport). This is the highest level of beneficiary benefits of all the EPWP programmes and has been confirmed in a recent impact study where beneficiaries have reported significant changes in theirs and their families’ living standards. The WoF Programme is operated through some 199 bases located in the most poverty stricken areas in our country.
The programme is implemented following a labour-intensive approach and integrates operations with social-development initiatives. It offers fire training to beneficiaries as part of its technical, health and safety training programme.
Since 2003, the WoF Programme has provided Integrated Veld and Forest Fire Management training to over 9 000 individuals. This training has been aimed at empowering all levels of the fire organisation to mitigate the negative impacts of fire in rural areas, in a milieu where global warming and environmental degradation continue to have significant effect on the social and economic conditions of our country.
The programme has specialised in providing skills and knowledge to Incident Commanders, Fire Managers, land owners, community members, Forestry Workers, Fire-fighters and beneficiaries of the programme as a means of ensuring that they are able to contribute to the safe and efficient suppression of unwanted fires. This is done without neglecting to develop the capacity of communities and organisations to protect themselves from unwanted fires and to prevent the fires from occurring in the first instance.
The training standards set by WoF meets and exceeds the Forest Protection Unit's Standards. In fact, the programme has adapted standards from the United States that are considered to be among the best in the world. Providing in-house training ensures that the programme participants receive quality assurance (registered training), access to trainings at a cheaper rate and that the programme is also able to offer entrepreneurial and life skills training to its beneficiaries.
Programme Director, not only has the WoF programme been able to employ and train many young unemployed people to become highly skilled wild-land fire fighters, but the invaluable work of the close to 200 teams across South Africa has continued to protect the environment through fire fighting and fire awareness campaigns.
After we officially unveiled the plaque on the Academy this morning, we will also witness the graduation ceremony of our environment cadres – Working on Fire graduates.
Ladies and gentlemen, with all that I hope we all have a clear understanding of the successes achieved by this Extended Public Works Programme initiative and how it contributes to ensuring a safer environment in many of our communities.
Let us all make sure we love and care for our environment, and be wild fire fighters and not fire creators. When we work for our environment, it will continue to provide us with water, food and clean air we need for a healthy South Africa.
I thank you.
Enquiries:
Zolile Nqayi
Cell: 082 898 6483
