Report shows improvements in quality of life for most South Africans
by Vivian Warby
2001-07-27
Change has come slowly to the lives of ordinary South Africans since 1994, but it has come. Millions more people today have access to water and electricity, are living in formal dwellings and have telephones; more are using public healthcare facilities; and more children are going to school, a Statistics SA report on the quality of life of ordinary South Africans shows.
The report presents the results of the 1999 October Household Survey and draws comparisons with surveys of the preceding four years. In some instances, the report shows, there has been a slight drop in living conditions. For instance, the number of households that have access to flush or chemical toilets decreased between 1995 and 1999. Formal education is, however, now reaching the vast majority of children between the ages of 7 and 15. Some 94% of these children now attend school. However, about 16% of South Africans aged 20 or older said they could not read.
While 83% of South African households have access to clean water, most of this water is not accessible inside the dwelling and people still have to walk to piped water on site or to a communal tap or public tanker to get clean water. The proportion of households that got their water from rivers, streams and dams remained more or less constant at between 11 and 12%.
About an extra 800 000 South Africans entered the labour market between 1995 and 1999 in both the formal and informal sectors - a very gradual increase. In that same period the number of unemployed rose by 1,4-million people - from 1,8-million to 3,2-million.
The number of South Africans using private healthcare facilities decreased marginally. Cellphones and home telephones made an impact on ordinary lives, with the number of households having either or both increasing by 6%. While more people were living in formal dwellings, there were also more people living in informal dwellings. There was no figure given for the homeless.
After 1994 it appears that electricity reached more people - but that it was used more for lighting than for cooking because of costs involved, the report states. The use of paraffin and gas decreased. Only half of all households, as in 1995, had access to formal refuse removal services in 1999. (Source: The Star, 26 July 2001)
Change has come slowly to the lives of ordinary South Africans since 1994, but it has come. And that's official.
Millions more people today have access to water and electricity, are living in formal dwellings and have telephones; more are using public healthcare facilities; and more children are going to school, a Statistics SA report on the quality of life of ordinary South Africans shows.
But not nearly as many people's lives had changed as was hoped soon after the 1994 election.
The changes have been gradual, and Finance Minister Trevor Manuel said that while the Statistics SA report, South Africa in Transition, was good news, it was perhaps not a story of cataclysmic change.
The report presents the results of the 1999 October Household Survey and draws comparisons with surveys of the preceding four years.
Manuel said the quality of lives of people, many of whom had been living in abject poverty, had improved in things such as access to water, which many took for granted.
However, millions of others still did not have access to these basics.
In some instances, the report shows, there has been a slight drop in living conditions. For instance, the number of households that have access to flush or chemical toilets decreased between 1995 and 1999.
Formal education is, however, now reaching the vast majority of children between the ages of 7 and 15. Some 94% of these children now attend school.
However, about 16% of South Africans aged 20 or older said they could not read.
While 83% of South African households have access to clean water, most of this water is not accessible inside the dwelling and people still have to walk to piped water on site or to a communal tap or public tanker to get clean water. The proportion of households that got their water from rivers, streams and dams remained more or less constant at between 11 and 12%.
About an extra 800 000 South Africans entered the labour market between 1995 and 1999 in both the formal and informal sectors - a very gradual increase. In that same period the number of unemployed rose by 1,4-million people - from 1,8-million to 3,2-million.
The number of South Africans using private healthcare facilities decreased marginally.
Cellphones and home telephones made an impact on ordinary lives, with the number of households having either or both increasing by 6%.
While more people were living in formal dwellings, there were also more people living in informal dwellings.
There was no figure given for the homeless.
After 1994 it appears that electricity reached more people - but that it was used more for lighting than for cooking because of costs involved, the report states.
The use of paraffin and gas decreased.
Only half of all households, as in 1995, had access to formal refuse removal services in 1999.
The graphs are perhaps still too flat, but that is the nature of change, said Manuel, adding that the government would try to improve the lives of South Africans. That is what democracy entails, he said.
Source: The Star, 26 July 2001
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