The red-tape shredders

25 July 2014 - 02:13 By Nashira Davids
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Red tape. File photo
Red tape. File photo
Image: Thinkstock

What is "strong and sticky" and can slow business development to a crawl?

Red tape, says the Western Cape economic development and tourism department, which estimates that up to 40% of a business's costs are spent on jumping over bureaucratic hurdles.

Almost three years ago the department established a Red Tape Reduction Unit to help businesses, particularly small and medium-sized ones, cope with red tape.

The unit has a call centre with six operators and resolves 90% of the problems phoned in.

Head of department Solly Fourie said that over the past 12 months, the unit had received roughly 1000 calls more than usual, and most were about municipal planning regulations.

Said Fourie: "There are also a lot of problems with company registrations."

The unit has called on provincial officials to devise ways of reducing "cumbersome red tape".

It wants to see greater use of "simple language in legislation and regulations to make them easier to understand".

Rudi Riek, a consultant to the Commercial Producers' Association, and chairman of the SA Association of Stills Producers, said his organisation had struggled for two years to get permission to use animals in photo shoots on the Atlantis Dunes on Cape Town's west coast.

He said the municipality had refused permission on the grounds that animals would be a threat to the environment.

Riek said this decision resulted in at least R30-million in revenue being lost to the city.

In March the unit came to his rescue and within a week officials had given permission for the filming of a falcon on the dunes.

"And the municipality has changed its policy about animals," said Riek.

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