4 August 2010

The new King Shaka International Airport near Durban created almost 50 000 jobs in the province during its construction but that is where the KwaZulu-Natal provincial government’s interest in the project’s job creation potential ended, a response to a parliamentary question has revealed. 

“It is extraordinary that the KwaZulu-Natal government would not invest in research to measure the long-term economic impact on the province’s job creation for its largest infrastructure project in living memory,” said IFP MPL Roman Liptak who directed the question to the MEC for Economic Development and Tourism Michael Mabuyakhulu in the KwaZulu-Natal Legislature. 

The only piece of research commissioned by the department to measure the economic impact on KwaZulu-Natal of the Dube Tradeport project, which includes the new airport, was limited to the period from the commencement of its construction until August 2009 when the project was still incomplete. 

The research conducted by IHS Global Insight concluded that the construction of the new airport created 58 972 jobs throughout South Africa, 48 295 in KwaZulu-Natal and 34 157 in eThekwini. Out of the jobs created throughout the national economy 13 880 were direct and 24 474 were indirect. 

“The new airport’s selling point was always its boost for KwaZulu-Natal’s long-term job creation. It is curious that the research into the economic impact of the R6.8-billion project only focused on temporary jobs and ignored permanent ones which are more important for the provincial economy,” said Liptak.  

The question that concerned the distribution of these jobs in the different sectors of the economy received no response from the department. The ministerial response admitted bluntly that in order to identify specific jobs created, “each firm that worked on the construction phase of the project and all of their suppliers would need to be interviewed in detail”. 

“Such gross imprecision regarding the new airport’s impact on job creation in KwaZulu-Natal comes as a surprise from the government that prides itself on scientific methods that supposedly underlie its economic policies,” said Liptak.

Contact:
Roman Liptak
078 302 0929