Our History

In 2005, an amendment to the National Environmental Management Act [No. 107 of 1998] (NEMA) created the Environmental Management Inspectorate.

This legislative development pulled together existing efforts in the “green” (biodiversity, protected areas), “brown” (environmental impact assessment, pollution and waste) and “blue” (marine and coastal) sub-sectors into a single, cohesive and effective legislative framework. It did this by creating a single chapter in the NEMA which created environmental management inspectors as compliance and enforcement officers with standard mandates, powers, functions and duties, responsible for ensuring that national environmental legislation is complied with and properly enforced where contraventions are detected.