The NEMLA Act - the long-awaited shift in South Africa's environmental legislative landscape is imminent

28th June 2022

The NEMLA Act - the long-awaited shift in South Africa's environmental legislative landscape is imminent

The NEMLA Bill finally became an Act on 24 June 2022 and will introduce a major shift in South Africa’s environmental legislation on a date to be fixed and proclaimed by the President.

Act No. 2 of 2022 – undoubtedly the most significant piece of environmental legislation since the implementation of the One Environmental System (OES) in 2014 – has finally been published and will soon become law (the Act).

This Act started out as the National Environmental Laws Amendment Bill, known as 'the NEMLA Bill' or 'NEMLAA4', when it was introduced to Parliament in 2017.  More than five years on, this Bill has finally ended its arduous parliamentary journey, which involved much debate and numerous changes following its rejection by the National Assembly in 2018, and its lapsing and subsequent revival in 2019.  We were kept on tenterhooks until the very end, when, despite being passed by both the National Assembly and the National Council of Provinces on 1 March 2022, it took almost four months for the Bill to be published.

Once the Act comes into operation, it will officially introduce a wholesale shift in South Africa's environmental legislative landscape.  Many of these changes are intended to clean up a range of issues associated with the roll-out of the OES – which overhauled the manner in which environmental issues are regulated on mine sites, among other things.  Overall, it is clear that the changes imposed by the Act aim to deter non-compliance with environmental laws by, among other things, introducing new offences, increasing the quantum of fines and administrative penalties where laws or licences have been contravened, and will extend enforcement powers to enable more widespread enforcement of environmental laws.

In the next couple of weeks, we will explore these proposed changes in a series of focused alerts. These alerts will consider the proposed amendments to the National Environmental Management Act, 1998 (NEMA), the National Environment Management: Air Quality Act, 2004 (NEMAQA), and National Environmental Management: Waste Act, 2008 (NEMWA), among others, and explore what these changes mean for your business and way in which it operates.  The important changes that will be considered include the following:

Written by Garyn Rapson, Partner, Kirsty Kilner, Partner & Carma Rossouw, Candidate Attorney from Webber Wentzel