In November 2018, the Sishen Iron Ore Company – Community Development Trust (SIOC-cdt) contracted Citizen Surveys to conduct a needs analysis within the five local municipalities in which it operates. This will assist the Trust to update its Community Development Strategy and ensure that it can have a meaningful impact on these Northern Cape and Limpopo communities.
Established in 2006 by Kumba Iron Ore Limited to invest in the development of the communities in which the company operates, SIOC-cdt derives dividends from its shareholding in the Sishen Iron Ore Company (SIOC) and has spent over R1-billion so far in community development projects.
These projects seek to strengthen the communities surrounding its mining activities and ensure that they are sustainable once these mines close.
“SIOC-cdt aims to have a genuine and lasting impact on these communities as a result of its community development projects, rather than relying on metrics such as how much money it has spent or projects it has funded,” says Managing Director of Citizen Surveys, Washeelah Kapery.
SIOC-cdt is active in five local municipalities. Four of these are in the Northern Cape and surround the Sishen Mine in Kathu and Kolomela Mine in Postmasburg. These are the Joe Morolong, Gasegonyana, Gamagara and Tsantsabane local municipalities. While the Thabazimbi Mine in Limpopo was recently sold to ArcellorMittal, SIOC-cdt has legacy projects and thus an obligation to communities within the Thabazimbi Local Municipality.
“We specialise in large-scale national surveys that investigate the perceptions, needs and experiences of South Africans,” continues Kapery, “and we have invested into developing research systems that enable us to provide strategic insights and solutions.”
“SIOC-cdt is in the process of updating its Community Development Strategy for the next five years and wants to ensure that its community development strategies and projects are based on sound research into the needs of the different communities,” says Vusani Malie CEO of SIOC-cdt. “Citizen Surveys will be conducting household surveys with communities, interviews with community leaders and subject experts, and integrating information from other data sources (e.g. Stats SA, municipal IDPs) into the findings. This will create a solid foundation to provide planners with the information they need to prioritize sustainable development projects to offer in a community. In this way, projects can be designed to alleviate real social and economic problems”.
The research will commence in mid- December 2018 and will run until the end of February 2019. Once this research has been completed, SIOC-cdt will make it available to other organisations engaged in social development within these communities.
ENDS
About SIOC-ctd
SIOC-cdt was established in 2006 by Kumba Iron Ore Limited to invest in the development of the communities in which the company operates. The trust focuses primarily on beneficiary communities adjacent to the Sishen Iron Ore Company (SIOC) mining activities in the Northern Cape and Thabazimbi local municipality in Limpopo and has invested significantly in community development projects aimed at ensuring sustainability beyond mining operations.
SIOC-cdt has substantiated its stated intention of “defining ourselves through actions not words” by investing over R1 billion in socio-economic and community development projects in its beneficiary communities.
About Citizen Surveys
For over 20 years, Citizen Surveys has been a leading South African market research consultancy. Founded by Washeelah Kapery in 1996, Citizen Surveys specialises in complex, large-scale national research studies, currently managing some of the biggest national tracking studies in the country.
The specialist team provides a full range of market research services to corporations, government, non-profit organizations, universities and international institutions.
In 2015, Citizen Surveys started the South African Citizen Survey (SACS), a monthly tracking survey, based on with a nationally-representative monthly sample of 1,300 face-to-face interviews on a variety of topics that map attitude and opinion in the country across politics, economics, social issues, food security and more. The data is released on a quarterly basis on a total of 3,900 respondents, which produces results with a margin of error of ±1.5 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.