Garden Route environment suffers as SA economy dips

During its annual key stakeholder report-back event on Wednesday 13 December, the Garden Route Environmental Forum (Gref) will be highlighting some of the most burning issues related to environmental management in the Garden Route.

Cobus Meiring of Gref says maintaining a healthy environment requires money, as any land manager will agree. "Dealing with the eradication and constant control of fast-spreading invasive alien plants (IAPs) in the Garden Route is a particularly expensive exercise. Although private landowners in the Garden Route go to great lengths to clear their land in line with legislation, they are facing an uphill battle as the costs related to petrol, herbicide and labour soar."

Similarly, mountain catchments and rivers are badly affected by invasive species such as pine and wattle, and there simply is no longer sufficient funding available for authorities to effectively deal with the scourge.

Working for Water not making a dent

According to Meiring, the Working

for Water programme (WfW) cannot even make a dent in the spreading of invasive plants in the Garden Route, as less money becomes available from Treasury.

WfW was established some three decades ago to deal with invasive alien plants on a national scale and in the process generate much-needed jobs.

"State-sponsored business models to clear land in collaboration with supporting environmental management agencies prove difficult to implement. Land cleared often falls back to historic densities and it is essential to do follow-up work, but it is expensive and is then not conducted," Meiring says.

Climate change boosts IAPs

He says the advent of climate change enhances the presence of IAPs in the landscape, and the cumulative effect of this on the destruction of biodiversity and availability of fresh water resources lost from catchments and river systems, already impacts on water security in South Africa.

In addition, a warmer climate with hotter and stronger winds impacts on stored water in dams and reservoirs as higher than normal evaporation rates takes its toll.

The shortage of funding negatively impacts the fight against alien vegetation. It is having a huge effect on the landscape in the Garden Route and will eventually affect water and food security.