Public Works and Infrastructure Minister Dean Macpherson
The work of Infrastructure South Africa (ISA) has been hailed by Public Works and Infrastructure Minister Dean Macpherson. He was delivering the keynote address, on Tuesday, at the Infrastructure Africa 2024 Conference, being held at the Cape Town International Convention Centre.
ISA is an agency of the national Department of Public Works and Infrastructure, and its mission is to design and maintain a country-wide portfolio of priority, credible, quality, high-impact projects that constitute a bankable investment pipeline. ISA is the core driver of the National Infrastructure Plan (NIP) 2050, and its responsibilities include dealing with policy and regulatory issues that block investment, as well as building investor confidence.
“I want to acknowledge the immense work that ISA has done to this point,” he highlighted. “They have created a rock-solid foundation for infrastructure development, planning and preparation in South Africa. Furthermore, they have shown themselves to be a trusted entity that the private sector can work with, to package bankable projects that attract funding from not only domestic sources, but foreign too.”
The NIP 2050 is divided into two phases, he pointed out. Phase 1 is focused on bulk infrastructure, that forms a “foundation” for the country and economy. This first phase is specifically concerned with bulk infrastructure in the energy, freight transport, telecommunications and water sectors. Phase 2 is focused on “distributed infrastructure” which is more closely concerned with businesses and communities.
Through ISA, the government has assembled a series of Strategic Integrated Projects (SIPs). These have grown in value from R340-billion in 2020 to R540-billion today. The biggest single portfolio within the SIPs is energy, including renewable energy and green hydrogen projects. But, to achieve economic growth that creates jobs, the country needs the total value of SIPs to double, to R1-trillion, he stated.
“We are committed to accelerating the full implementation of initiatives to build private sector confidence in the capacity and capability of the State to deliver bankable public infrastructure projects, promote quality and efficacy of the preparation of the preparation phases of public infrastructure projects, as well as account on the progress of these projects,” assured Macpherson.