District Development Agencies must be up and running
KwaZulu-Natal Government has made bold steps in ensuring that municipalities are assisted in setting up economic drivers in their respective municipal areas. This emerged at the workshop for the District Development Agencies (DDAs).
Speaking at the workshop, held at Ballito, near Durban on the 18th November 2014, MEC for Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Ms Nomusa Dube-Ncube said that wants to see DDAs being set up in all Districts in the Province as soon as matter of urgency.
MEC Dube-Ncube says “DDAs are a unique concept intended to serve as future local economic growth drivers of the district and local municipalities in KZN. These special purpose vehicles are designed as the implementers of strategic economic development projects and programmes for the family of municipalities within the districts, facilitating both private and public sector investments through inclusive projects”.
The District Development Agencies are strategic vehicles for Local Economic Development, focusing mainly on the implementation and realisation of larger scale sustainable economic projects in the Districts. The agencies will strengthen socio-economic development through growth in employment and the eradication of poverty.
Once fully operational, they are expected to create economic development capacity and ability at local government level to work in partnership with, and further strengthen, the existing LED initiatives of the municipalities. Whereas LED units in municipalities focus on broadening the economic base and creating an environment conducive to economic development, they will focus on catalytic projects and programmes leading directly to investment and job creation.
The aim of the workshop is to address the resolution of the recently held Provincial Local Economic Development Summit which tasked COGTA to formulate a strategy for the District Development Agencies in this province. This concept has been condensed into an information brochure which this workshop will present to the stakeholders for distribution in KZN.
