Report on Delivery to Women

7. ENVIRONMENTAL AFFAIRS AND TOURISM

Internal Achievements

• The Department has an official policy on acceleration of equality between men and women until it reaches 50% at all levels. The current gender statistics are as follows:
  • Top management: 7.4% (33% to be achieved by December 1999).
  • Middle Management: 22%
  • Junior Management: 29%
  • Entry Ranks: 31.8%
  • The Deputy Director General is a woman.
  • A policy on sexual harassment has been drafted and will be implemented before May 1999.
  • Gender sensitisation workshops, with participation from NGOs, have been held for managers and officials in the Department and in some of the Provinces.
  • The Department plays a role in the initiative of women and environment, which aims at a national co-ordinating body including NGOs and Provincial Departments.

Achievements For South African Women

Policies and Legislation

• The White Paper on Environmental Management aims at encouraging and supporting women in the design, planning and implementation of environmental education and capacity building programmes and projects
• The Departmental Tourism Policy acknowledges that women, and particularly those living in rural areas, can play a significant role in the new tourism drive of the country and earn benefit from it. The paper gives emphasis to the roles that women can play in tourism - in awareness development, as decision makers and as implementers of community projects. The Tourism Policy is also enabling, so that by 2010, more than 174, 000 new jobs can be created directly in the travel and tourism industry, and 516, 000 jobs can be created, directly and indirectly, across the broader South African economy. These will involve high levels of training, pay higher than average wages and be particularly accessible to women, unskilled people and new entrants to the job market. Most of the new jobs will be in areas where structural unemployment is most high.
• The White Paper on Integrated Pollution and Waste Management Policy committed the Department to providing education for women in integrated pollution and waste management because they are the traditional custodians of natural resources, especially in rural areas.

Programmes and Activities

• The environmental management programme includes provision for training, public liaison and broad-based environmental education. There has been some training of women in environmental conservation.
• The following steps are proposed for engendering the Convention to Combat Desertification (CCD):
  • A gender audit and impact analysis of the CCD
  • The development of a set of indicators and/or a checklist for the National Action Programme (NAP) process
  • The development of a CCD/NAP Toolkit consisting of gender planning technologies targeting all levels of decision-makers involved in the CCD/NAP process
  • The presentation of the audit, indicators and tools to the Gender Focal Points of the relevant departments and other role players for discussion and consultation before implementation.
  • The Department’s five-year programme includes eliminating violence against women by implementing environmental rights that will make women less vulnerable, and by implementing the tourism strategy to empower women.
  • A national capacity building framework in the field of waste management will be targeted at women.
  • The Department will develop a community awareness programme on natural disasters primarily targeted at women and children.

Budget Allocations

• The Department intends to have a specific budget for projects and programmes aimed at women, especially in terms of the Department’s five-year programme to eliminate violence against women.