PTWC Special Report Part 5: South Africa’s flawed ‘One Environmental System’
In the fifth part of our series of excerpts from the Protect the West Coast (PTWC) Special Report ‘The Tipping Point’, we take a closer look at the controversial ‘One Environmental System’ (OES), South African mining’s environmental authorisation regime. The Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act 28 of 2002 (MPRDA), establishes the framework for mineral extraction in South Africa, and The National Environmental Management Act 107 of 1998 (NEMA) sets the environmental requirements that mining must meet. While seemingly effective in theory, the OES is in fact a deeply flawed system that brings the two Acts together under one decision-maker, being the department that also promotes mining, with potentially negative impacts on the environment and communities.
PTWC Legal Team Raises Serious Concerns About Environmental Assessment Practitioners
The legal team at Protect the West Coast (PTWC) has raised serious concerns about the apparent lack of scientific rigour and specialist qualifications in applications prepared by some Environmental Assessment Practitioners (EAPs). Tasked by the mining industry to compile documents required for decisions to be made on mining applications, the EAP’s job entails the consideration of complex scientific findings and research, which then needs to be collated and accurately recorded for the decision makers to make an informed decision on any application. PTWC contends, however, that many applications fall woefully short of legal requirements.
PTWC and Wild Coast activists find common ground at Wetlands Conference
Protect the West Coast (PTWC) was invited in late October to participate in a panel discussion at the 2026 National Wetlands Indaba in Langebaan, under the theme of ‘Wetlands and Traditional Knowledge’. The panel discussion featured Steve Pike of PTWC and Nonhle Mbuthuma of the Amadiba Crisis Committee (ACC) from the mining-affected Xolobeni community in the Eastern Cape, who found a number of common talking points about the arid West Coast and the subtropical Wild Coast, as they discussed how industrial development is driven by the same deeply inadequate understanding of cumulative threats to the environment and communities.
