Municipalities play a pivotal role in the delivery of the basic social services necessary to improve the living standard of South Africans. Yet it is sometimes difficult to establish what progress individual municipal structures are making in meeting this core obligation, and how each municipality is performing compared with provincial and national averages.
Municipalities collect and collate information on delivery of services in their respective areas.
They have a large amount of data that can be used to profile the households residing within the municipal area, through billing records, valuation of properties and databases recording electricity and water consumption.
However, this data is of variable accuracy, reliability and quality. Different methods of collection and recording often make comparisons between different municipalities extremely difficult.
With these gaps in data and information in mind, Statistics SA conducted a community survey in February last year. This was a stratified, multistage probability survey that reached out to 284 000 households, designed to provide information on each municipal area.
The first results of this survey, released last October, provided a picture of delivery of services at national and provincial level. This week, Stats SA released municipal-level information detailing the progress that has been made in delivering basic services within each municipal area.
This week's release of data from the survey provides information at national, provincial and municipal levels, with data for selected variables summarised for each local municipality and compared with national and provincial averages.
Variables reported on for each municipality include the type of dwelling occupied by households, use of electricity, sanitation, access to water and refuse removal.
The survey reports that six of the nine provinces recorded higher averages living in formal dwellings when compared with South Africa as a whole (70.6 percent). These are Western Cape (83.4 percent), Limpopo (83.2 percent) Northern Cape (80.4 percent), Mpumalanga (77 percent), Gauteng (73.5 percent) and Free State (71 percent).
Three provinces recorded higher percentages of households living in informal dwellings, compared with South Africa as a whole (14.4 percent): Free State (18.4 percent), Gauteng (22.7 percent) and North West (23.8 percent).
Free State, North West and Western Cape had the highest percentages of municipalities whose proportion of households using electricity for lighting exceeds the national average of 80 percent. Overall, 54 percent of the municipalities had higher proportions of their households using electricity for lighting than the national average.
According to the survey, pit latrines are most common in Limpopo (64.5 percent) and least common in Western Cape (0.8 percent). Bucket toilets are mostly used in Free State (12.7 percent), Northern Cape (4.4 percent), and North West (4.2 percent). The national average is 2.2 percent.
While it is clear that there has been an overall increase in the rate of delivery of core municipal services, it is equally clear that some municipalities have a long road to travel before they reach national and provincial averages.
Pali Lehohla is South Africa's statistician-general, and head of Statistics SA. For more information and the latest reports from the Community Survey, visit www.statssa.gov.