SA’s drought crisis is a national disaster, according to Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Zweli Mkhize, who is also responsible for the National Disaster Management Centre. A provisional allocation of R6bn has been set aside for the 2018-19 financial year for several purposes, including drought relief and to augment public infrastructure investment. The minister declared the continuing drought in the Western Cape, Eastern Cape and Northern Cape as a national state of disaster considering the effect on all sectors of the economy throughout the country. Industries such as livestock production, crop production, manufacturing and processing, tourism, and food security affected the country’s trade balance, he said. “It is on this basis that in 2016 the Bureau for Food and Agricultural Policy noted that the impacts of drought conditions cannot be considered in isolation from global markets and the wider macro-economic environment in which the country’s agricultural...
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