By Nangamso Mabindla
5 February 2007

DUNCAN Village environmental issues came under the spotlight when officials from the Norwegian Pollution Control Authority visited Buffalo City last week.

The visitors looked at environmental issues, including waste management, in areas like Duncan Village. The authority's Rune Vistad said that the national Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism was looking at ways of improving environmental education in South Africa.

"However, for this education to be a success [the department] decided to start at local level, with the help of local authorities."

It identified municipalities that would pilot environmental education programmes in their communities, looking at Johannesburg, Durban, Nelson Mandela Municipality and Buffalo City.

"We decided on the two big municipalities in the Eastern Cape; that is why we have come to Duncan Village in Buffalo City to look at the environmental conditions of the area," he said.

The visitors included two advisers from the authority's international affairs division and one from its waste management division. Once they had finished studying environmental conditions in Duncan Village, they would compile a business plan for possible funding.

"We want to look at environmental issues where we have competences and where we have weaknesses and try to address these issues," Vistad said. "Once we get to know these things we will include them in our business plan. Next week we will definitely know what we are dealing with when it comes to environmental issues in Buffalo City."

They undertook a two-day tour of Duncan Village.