Local Government, Environmental Affairs and Development Planning

1. Marine Living Resource Management is the mandate of the national Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, Branch Fisheries. This includes ensuring the sustainable use of and orderly access to marine living resources through improved management and regulation and the development of South Africa's fisheries sector. This is done under the Marine Living Resources Act (Act 18 of 1998).  The mandate for fishing and fishing resources is thus under the purview of the National Government.

The National Environmental Management: Integrated Coastal Management Act, 1998 (Act No. 107 of 1998) (“NEM: ICMA”) sets out to manage the nation’s coastal resources, promote social equity and best economic use of coastal resources whilst protecting the natural environment.  In terms of Section 38 of the NEM: ICMA, the Department of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning (“the department”) is the provincial lead agency for coastal management in the Western Cape. 

In 2018, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) with support from the Western Cape Government released a report called Boosting Skills for Greener Jobs in the Western Cape Province of South Africa.  The report indicated that the Aquaculture Sector had great potential in the Western Cape but that it along with the fishing industry faced a number of environmental risks including; overexploitation of Marine Resources and Threatened Marine Biozones with most capture fisheries and other marine resources worldwide considered fully exploited or over exploited.

In a national context, the marine ecosystems around the Western Cape coast are highly productive and support most of the country’s 22 fisheries (Turpie and et al, 2014[7]). These fisheries are diverse in size and economic contribution, ranging from the large-scale industrial pelagic, and demersal fisheries that account for most of the economic contribution of fisheries, to low-cost small-scale inshore fisheries such as West Coast rock lobster, traditional line-fish and seine-net fisheries.

Since the OECD report released in 2018 the DEA&DP has not commissioned or supported any studies on the economic contribution of recreational fisheries to the provincial economy. DEDAT: Economic Sector Support has also indicated that no studies on fishing resources in Western Cape have been conducted.

2. Relates to a), The DEA&DP and DEDAT have not commissioned any reports related to the economic value of Fishing and Fisheries to the Western Cape GDP and employment. The DFFE Fisheries management (Status of Marine Fishery Resources 2023) releases reports on an annual basis. The YEAR 9 report is still in the process of being completed. Previous years reports are available on the Fisheries and Aquaculture and the Phakisa Year Reviews are available on the DFFE websites at: https://www.dffe.gov.za/index.php/FisheriesManagementPublications
3. The mandate for fisheries resources and management thereof rests with National Government, this along with the resource constraints experienced by Provincial departments and the DEA&DP specifically means, there are no available resources to conduct any studies in support of the fisheries sector. The DEA&DP has a large coastal and estuary mandate which is yet to receive appropriate resourcing and the finalisation of its organisational redesign, significantly impacted by cost containment. The DEA&DP participates in the Operation Phakisa LAB workstreams and supports these workstreams within the Western Cape as they relate to small harbours, aquaculture and Small Scale Fisheries and general support to the DFFE Oceans Economy.

CapeNature manages six (6) Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) in the Western Cape on behalf of DFFE. and is responsible for the day to day running of these MPAs, meaning compliance monitoring, enforcing regulations and protecting the environment and working with partners to deliver coastal and marine conservation services, specifically to ensure the sustainable use of our marine living resources including fisheries.

4. CapeNature, the WCG entity for biodiversity conservation has initiated a partnership with the Gansbaai Angling Association and other interested anglers and coastal users to ensure proactive and manageable access to CapeNature coastal nature reserve managed by the Walker Bay Office. The Overberg reserves were evaluated and existing management tracks within the coastal zone were identified to allow for controlled access to important angling sites. These tracks were proactively presented to the Overstrand Municipality, DEA&DP and DFFE to ensure compliance with legislation as well as to ensure acceptability by anglers and Government. The aim of this pro-active process was to support recreational angling as an industry in the rural town of Gansbaai as well as support the local tourism industry that benefits from visiting anglers. This is an ongoing process that requires continual communications and awareness interventions as well and proactive management interventions to ensure ecosystem conservation while supporting the recreational fishery based at Gansbaai in this case.The DEA&DP holds the responsibility for listing of Public Launch Sites in terms of Public Launch Site Regulations under the NEM: ICMA and collaborates both with DFFE Small Scale Fisheries and Municipalities to enable physical access to the sea where required and in terms of approved Operational Management Plans. This role is further elaborated under e) below.

e)    The DEA&DP does not have available resources to allocate support to activities that are not part of its core coastal and estuary mandate. The provincial coastal and estuary programme has been planned and approved as part of the Western Cape Coastal Management Programme 2022-2027 and is being implemented as funds allow.

The facilitation of public access to the coast is an objective of the NEM: ICMA as well as a Priority in the WC PCMP.  The Department developed the Provincial Coastal Access Strategy and Plan, 2017 (“PCASP”) and commissioned coastal access audits per municipal district to assist municipalities with identifying existing, historic, and desired public coastal access.  These coastal access audits also identify hotspots or areas of conflict to assist the municipalities with facilitating public access in terms of Section 18 of the NEM: ICMA.  The Department also acts as the competent authority for the administration of the “Management of public launch sites in the coastal zone (GN No. 497, 27 June 2014) “Public Launch Site Regulations”.  Operational Management Plans are approved by the Minister and these ensure that the needs of Small Scale and Recreational fishing sectors are accommodated.