An Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) workshop, hosted by the KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (CoGTA), was held on Friday, 21 June 2013 at the Durban Botanic Gardens.
EPWP is one of the government arrays of programmes aimed at providing poverty and income relief through temporary work for the unemployed to carry out socially useful activities. The workshop was facilitated by a Manager from LED in the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Ms Nomzamo Kaunda.
In the State of the Nation Address for 2013, Honourable president Zuma had mentioned the target for the creation of 11 million jobs by 2030 as stipulated by the National Development Plan. The president has therefore called for partnerships between sector departments within government and the private sector in combating unemployment in the country.
Therefore, EPWP is one of the government arrays of programmes aimed at providing poverty and income relief through temporary work for the unemployed to carry out socially useful activities.
The short term objectives of EPWP are, firstly to create 2 million Full Time Equivalent (FTE) work opportunities for the poor and unemployed people in South Africa so as to contribute to halving unemployment by 2014, through the delivery of public and community services.
Secondly for EPWP to enable government to act as an employer of last resort as part of the Anti-Poverty Strategy. Therefore, the EPWP is also expected to provide skills to the beneficiaries, so that those skills can be used by beneficiaries to acquire formal employment from either the private sector or the government, or even starting small businesses.
Hence, the National Department of Public Works (NDPW) in partnership with the KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Departments of Transport (DoT) and Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA), have already embarked on an initiative of assisting the Local Government (municipalities) in the implementation of their Expanded Public Works Programmes.
Local government is targeted because that is where most unemployed and poor people that require employment assistance reside. The municipalities are in close contact of the indigent communities, hence, it was deemed crucial in assisting them with resources to intensify EPWP.
The NDPW provides the EPWP framework guidelines as well as incentive grant funds for the programme; whereas, the DoT provides technical support to municipalities through the use of consultants that assist municipalities in developing their EPWP policies as well as other implementation and COGTA assists in the overall coordination of all municipalities to fully comply with the EPWP policy framework when implementing their projects
Therefore, COGTA hosted an EPWP Provincial Workshop in Durban Botanic Gardens on the 21st of June 2013. The workshop targeted all the provincial municipalities whilst engaging stakeholders such as the Provincial Department of Transport, the National Department of Public wWorks, the Provincial Department of Public works and Independent Development Trust.
The main aim of the workshop was to provide a platform for all stakeholders involved in the EPWP programme to have a common understanding of the goals of EPWP, as well as to discuss challenges that are faced by the municipalities as they implement the programme.
The municipalities’ were therefore provided with support that is enough to equip them with all the necessary guidelines that will assist them in correctly implementing all their EPWP projects.
Over and above that, the workshop also strongly looked at each operation that contributes towards characterising an EPWP project, correct Reporting methods on EPWP projects, correct ways of developing the labour intensive projects, correct steps to be followed during the branding of the projects and a common understanding of the targeted beneficiaries for EPWP such as creation of job opportunities for the locally unemployed and unskilled youth, women and the disabled people.
The workshop therefore recommended the following resolutions:
- To conduct more trainings on the new reporting system (MIS) , phase one of trainings have already been conducted for all municipalities, but more training sessions will be scheduled again, to ensure that all municipalities are able to use the system
- All municipalities to submit their draft EPWP policies and also provide DPW with dates of tabling the policies to council for approval, by end of June.
- To start initiatives to mobilize other sectors of EPWP within the municipalities, because at the moment EPWP seems to be focusing on infrastructure sector only. Therefore, a strategy for municipalities to mobilize other sectors will be developed and presented by the NDPW, since they have sector specialists
- Municipalities need to ensure compliance on expenditure reporting as far as their EPWP incentive grants are concerned
- Correct branding of all EPWP projects on all sites to ensure visibility and awareness on the programme
- All stakeholders in EPWP need to develop a campaign to showcase all EPWP projects in the province, this will be done through EPWP District Road shows where the political champions will be present as well
- To coordinate the EPWP Indaba that will be conducted by the end of August or early September 2013 The Indaba will target all stakeholders in EPWP where EPWP phase 2 will be evaluated, and phase 3 will be introduced with its implementation plans.
