Mofutsanyana District Municipality
4 March 2009
The Free State MEC for Agriculture, Me Mamiki Qabathe, will donate fire
fighting equipment to the Thabo Mofutsanyana District Municipality on Friday, 6
March 2009.
This is necessitated by the fact that most of the local municipalities in
the Free State province are affected by veldfires on an annual basis. The cost
of relief, and the losses to farmers both commercial and emerging, amount to
hundreds of millions of rands every year.
Dihlabeng Local Municipality is area most ravaged by these fires closely
followed by Maluti-A-Phofung Local Municipality. Phumelela has large fires as
does Cornelia in Mafube Local Municipality, however the number of fires in
these two areas is low but when fires do occur they tend to turn into large
ones. Both these areas have low population densities, large farms, and high
fuel loads in excess of 2 500 kilograms per hectare. The portion of Setsoto
most ravaged by fires is the mountainous region of Ficksburg to
Fouriesburg.
The department believes that steps can be taken to reduce or even prevent
the occurrence of these disastrous veldfires in the province. This pro-active
exercise will not only save government support on an annually basis but will
protect the sustainability of agricultural resources over a wide spectrum.
The prevention of veldfire hazards will directly assist the viability of the
economy in the Free State province. The consequence is that drought and other
disastrous hazards will be easily managed through the protection of valuable
veldt and veldt fodder banks.
The National Veldt and Forest Fires Act of 1998 require that landowners take
particular measures for fire protection, and that communities should establish
Fire Protection Associations (FPA) to address the need for co-ordinated fire
management.
It is against this background the Department of Agriculture (DoA), Free
State have made R2,5 million available for the procurement of fire fighting
prevention equipment for the emerging farmers, Fire Prevention Associations
(FPA) and help fire functional groups in the areas annually affected by
veldfires in the Free State province.
The department will donate 150 slip on units (5 00l), fire-fighting truck (4
000 litres) 4X2 and other essential fire fighting equipments to the Thabo
Mofutsanyana District Municipality to enable the district municipality to
better support local municipalities FPAs to fight veldt fires occurrences in
the district area.
The department will also enter into a service level agreement with the
district municipality who will further enter into agreements with the local
municipalities and the FPAs on the usage of this equipments and the maintenance
thereof.
The MEC will further engage on an Identity Document (ID) Campaign on
Saturday, 7 March 2009.
Both events are arranged as follows:
Donation of fire fighting equipment
Date: 6 March 2009
Venue: Bethlehem's Gobble Park Stadium
Time: 10h00
Identity Document (ID) Campaign
Date: 7 March 2009
Venue: Mphophomo Intermediate School, Waterfall Farm, Van Reenen area
For enquiries contact:
Ntai Mokhitli
Cell: 082 883 7317
Issued by: Department of Agriculture, Free State Provincial Government
4 March 2009
