Infrastructure

Question by: 
Hon Brett Herron
Answered by: 
Hon Tertuis Simmers
Question Number: 
3
Question Body: 

With reference to his reply to question  2 of 11 July 2025:

  1. Of those 1 274 informal settlements in the Western Cape, how many, if any, are on (a) privately owned land, (b) land owned by the national government, (c) land owned by the provincial government and (d) land owned by local governments;
  2. whether his Department does not include informal settlements on privately owned land; if so, what is the (a) full extent of the number of informal settlements in the province and (b) number of households located in informal settlements;
  3. whether (a) backyard dwellings and (b) informal structures in formal areas are included in these figures; if not, why not;
  4. (a) when was the 2024 Informal Settlements Database last updated and (b) how frequently is it revised;
  5. whether there has been an increase or decrease in the number of (a) informal settle-ments or (b) households in informal settlements compared to previous years; if so, what are the relevant details;

(6)  which municipalities have experienced the fastest growth in informal settlements?

Answer Body: 

 

  1. (a)(b)(c)(d) Breakdown of land ownership for the non-metro informal settlements:

Land ownership

Number of Informal Settlements

Private

43

National Government

18

Provincial Government

14

Local Government

341

Local Government/Private

26

Local Government/ National

3

National / Provincial

1

Total

446

The above breakdown excludes the informal settlements within the metro, as the corresponding database to extract similar information is maintained and kept by the City of Cape Town. 

  1. All informal settlements in the province are captured and accounted for in our database. This includes those located on privately owned land, in line with the Constitutional mandate requiring municipalities to provide basic municipal services to all communities within their jurisdiction, irrespective of whether the land is privately or publicly owned. The Department’s role is to support municipalities in fulfilling this mandate by ensuring that planning, funding, and technical assistance are coordinated to enable effective service delivery in informal settlements, regardless of land ownership.
  2. Full extent of the number of informal settlements in the province

District

Number of Informal Settlements

Cape Winelands

113

Central Karoo

4

Garden Route

232

Overberg

60

West Coast

37

Non-Metro Total

446

Metro – City of Cape Town

828

WC Total

1274

 

  1. There are approximately 405,040 households located in informal settlements across the province.
  2. (a)(b) With the various definitions attributed to the classification, backyard dwellings and informal structures in formal areas over a certain number are classified and included in these figures.
  3. (a)(b) The process of updating the Department’s database relies on municipalities submitting accurate, settlement-level data and GIS aerial imagery mapping. While the database is continuously updated in-house, the Department determines specific publication dates for new data to ensure clarity and consistency in reporting.
  4. (a)(b) According to the current Informal Settlement Database and the City of Cape Town database, there has been no significant increase in informal settlements when compared to the period during the Covid-19 lockdown. However, the number of households residing in informal settlements has increased over the years, primarily due to the expansion in size and extent of many existing informal settlements.
  5. The City of Cape Town (Metro) has seen the fastest and largest growth in informal settlements in the Western Cape by far. Among the non-metro local municipalities the Cape Winelands, notably Drakenstein Municipality and Stellenbosch Municipality, together with parts of the West Coast (Swartland Municipality) area show the most noticeable increases in recent times.
Date: 
Friday, November 14, 2025
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