RBIDZ Receives Clean Audit

2015-10-01

The Richards Bay Industrial Development Zone has obtained an unqualified audit in 2010/11 and for 2011/12 has received a totally clean audit from its external auditors without any matters of emphasis. The achievement is significant as it is the only provincial entity out of eleven Public Entities that report to the Provincial Department of Economic Development and Tourism to have received this significant achievement in 2011/2012 financial year cycle.

The IDZ programme, which is a National Government initiative, of which the Richards Bay Industrial Development Zone (RBIDZ) forms a part of, is intended to promote local beneficiation of products prior to export, thereby creating jobs and improving South Africa’s balance of trade.

Although a state owned institution, the RBIDZ, like other developers is also obliged to pay substantial electrical and civil contributions to the local authority for the provision of bulk services. The RBIDZ has already paid R74,6 million to the City of uMhlathuze for bulk services for Phase 1A alone, which will be used to enhance the bulk networks of the City to accommodate the RBIDZ and its potential investors.

For each potential investor that applies to the RBIDZ to setup a factory, numerous legal requirements need to be met including the necessary environmental processes, before any construction can commence. An average EIA takes approximately 18 months to complete.

The Richards Bay Industrial Development Zone has already paid an amount of R124 million to the City of Umhlathuze for the purchase of its land for Phase 1A and Phase 1F (216 hectares in total).

To date, the RBIDZ has already created 250 construction jobs developing land adjacent to the Port, in its Phase 1A, stage 1 construction.

The RBIDZ in its last financial year has spent 12% of Total Measured Procurement Spend on Qualifying Small Enterprises (QSE’s) and Exempted Micro Enterprises (EME’s), which is contributing significantly to the support of local SMME’s.

Further, the RBIDZ has commissioned a 50 year master plan to determine how it will be best able to meet the needs of all stakeholders, including investors and the local community, over the next 50 years. This master plan is set to be a national case study as it will be used by several new SEZ’s for benchmarking purposes.

CEO Mr Ike Nxedlana has made the commitment that “The Richards Bay Industrial Development Zone is committed to ensuring that they play their role in helping to achieve Government’s objectives of creating jobs and investments for our area”. The clean audit report is as a result of robust control environment policies and procedures approved by the Board and implemented by the RBIDZ staff. It is a foundation for good governance in our endeavour to deliver on the mandate of the IDZ programme. A special thank you to the finance team and the oversight committees of the Board (Audit and Risk Committee) for the support and advice provided to achieve the targeted clean audit milestone a year in advance. The challenge is now to maintain the clean (administration) audit status and not regress”, commented CEO Mr Ike Nxedlana.