Improving the implementation of the DBSA's environmental management capacity building at local government level

Abstract

Having followed various different approaches in environmental management capacity building for a number of years, the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) achieved various degrees of success. The increased importance of environmental management at local government level required a more consistent approach from the DBSA in order to improve delivery. This necessitated the identification of success criteria that the DBSA could implement to guide this improvement. In order to identify these criteria, the following main aspects were researched: The environmental mandate and capacity of local government in South Africa, the international perspective on capacity building, the DBSA’s mandate on capacity building and lastly the outcomes of four environmental capacity building projects implemented by the DBSA. The criteria identified focussed on two main areas, namely project management and environmental management. Furthermore, various steps were identified that the DBSA needs to take with relation to its own project cycle that might lead to improvements in this regard.