Cape Town - Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment Minister Barbara Creecy has signed off on South Africa’s first National Biodiversity Offset Guideline.
The guideline will minimise and offset biodiversity loss as a result of the negative impacts of unsustainable development on the country’s natural environment.
The guideline, which has now been published for implementation, has its genesis in a 2018 National Biodiversity Assessment (NBA) report by the South African National Biodiversity Institute (Sanbi).
That report revealed that South Africa’s biodiversity was rapidly declining and ecosystems were being degraded quickly.
At the time Dr Andrew Skowno, lead scientist for the NBA at Sanbi, said: “Unfortunately, across our assessments, climate change is emerging as a more apparent threat to our species and ecosystems.”
The NBA was a four-year project undertaken by 480 scientists from 90 organisations. It revealed how almost half of all the country’s 1 021 ecosystem types were threatened with ecological collapse and one in seven of the 23 312 indigenous species assessed were threatened with extinction.
Major pressures included habitat loss, changes to freshwater flow, overuse of some species, pollution, climate change and invasive alien species.
The NBA called for urgent action to slow down the loss and degradation of these natural assets. Signing off on the guideline Creecy said: “Biodiversity offsetting, which forms part of the mitigation hierarchy envisioned in the National Environmental Management Act (Nema) principles, is a relatively novel practice in South Africa.
“It has not always been implemented in an evidence-based and consistent manner, therefore the guideline serves to provide a degree of consistency and standardisation in the implementation thereof.”
She said the guideline will also serve as an intervention aimed at improved protection for, and appropriate management of, biodiversity.
Creecy said: “The guideline applies to the terrestrial and freshwater realms, and not to offshore marine areas or estuarine ecosystems. That does not, however, mean that biodiversity offsetting is not required where development will have negative impacts on marine or estuarine ecosystems.”
In a statement about the guideline, the department said that the guideline is not legally binding.
Neither does it replace the environmental authorisation (EA) process outlined in Nema or the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Regulations.
“It augments the legislation by guiding the implementation of Nema and the EIA Regulations in the context of mitigation of impacts on biodiversity and the use of biodiversity offsets.”
Department spokesperson Peter Mbelengwa said that if done correctly, the biodiversity outcome, as a result of the intervention, counterbalances the negative impact of an activity on biodiversity.
He said that the fundamental principles were spelt out in the guideline for offsetting biodiversity in South Africa.
He said this includes guidance on when offsets are required, how to determine the requirements for biodiversity offsets and how to ensure that the actions taken are binding on the person liable for implementation.
Executive Director at Southern African Faith Communities' Environment Institute (SAFCEI) Francesca de Gasparis said they welcome the recognition of biodiversity as an essential component of life on earth and human well-being as a part of the web of life.
However, De Gasparis said they were concerned that the concept of offsetting implied that whatever was consumed in one area could simply be replaced elsewhere.
“We are already consuming too much. Ecosystems need to be protected, not offset.
“Unless we truly count the cost of loss of biodiversity in terms of all the systems and values held that are a part of people and planet, we will continue to use and lose precious non renewable biodiversity,” De Gasparis said.