This article was first published in the Financial Mail on 13 November 2025.
On October 17, as part of the complex sequence of events, meetings and announcements that characterise the G20 South Africa 2025, the environment and climate ministers of the G20 countries adopted the Cape Town ministerial declaration on crimes that affect the environment and the Cape Town ministerial declaration on air quality.
The department of forestry, fisheries & the environment (DFFE) published a media release claiming these two declarations to be “historic firsts under (South Africa’s) G20 presidency, signalling global recognition of their urgency and cross-cutting impact on people, ecosystems and economies”.
Dion George, likely soon to be the ex-minister of that portfolio, proclaimed that South Africa had “brought these critical issues to the top of the global agenda, protecting our people and our environment, ensuring that justice and health walk hand in hand”.
The air quality declaration recognises “the significant risks that poor air quality poses and the need to improve air quality to address impacts on human health, particularly for persons in vulnerable situations, including children, the elderly and persons living with disabilities”. It also recognises that “air pollution, both indoor and outdoor, is a contributor to the global burden of disease, and a cause of premature mortality, and a high economic cost”.
The declaration encourages collaboration and recognises that open access to reliable air quality data is crucial. However, in the time-honoured tradition of grand political statements, it makes no firm commitments to do anything that might improve air quality. It does, however, welcome “the South African presidency’s commitment to convening a technical workshop, with a view to continuing the consideration of air quality, among G20 members, on a voluntary basis”.
Instead of meeting in Cape Town — presumably at a fancy hotel with a view of Table Mountain — the G20 climate and environment ministers should have met in Mpumalanga.
In Emalahleni or Secunda, or in the shadows of any of the province’s 11 coal-fired power stations, they could have experienced first-hand just how little South Africa, its presidency and our environment department really care about “justice and health walking hand in hand”.
George could have briefed his fellow custodians of the environment on how South Africa’s minimum emission standards for toxic air pollution are far weaker than those in developing countries notorious for their poor air quality, like China and India.
He could have told them how in 2018 one of his predecessors, without public consultation or explanation, dramatically weakened South Africa’s sulphur dioxide (SO₂) standard for coal boilers, undoubtedly as a favour to Eskom and Sasol. These entities together emit hundreds of kilotons of SO₂ every year, and the DFFE continuously grants them postponements and exemptions from legal compliance with air pollution laws.
George could have told them about the Pretoria high court’s recognition that the poor air quality in the Mpumalanga highveld breaches residents’ constitutional right to an environment not harmful to their health or wellbeing, and that his immediate predecessor appealed against that court’s order that she make regulations to implement and enforce the area’s air quality management plan.
He could have explained why the 2021 findings of a specially constituted ministerial SO₂ expert panel have never been released to the public.
The list of government failures to improve air quality goes on and on. The declaration might have had a touch more credibility had it been called the “Mpumalanga declaration on air quality” and been accompanied by at least some concrete commitment to action.
The commitment instead to hold a “technical workshop” is particularly galling, as it implies that there is some kind of practical or mechanical obstacle to be overcome to address air quality problems, something complicated that needs to be “workshopped” before progress can be made.
In reality, of course, the solution is simple: apply the law. It would be even more exciting if air quality laws could be strengthened to align with standards necessary to protect human health, but, in the meantime, what a win it would be if even our pathetically weak standards could actually be enforced.
The DFFE’s crowing about this toothless declaration is an insult to the hundreds of thousands of people in South Africa’s air pollution hotspots who suffer from respiratory symptoms that curtail their productivity and harm their quality of life, not to mention the tens of thousands who die prematurely every year.
There can be only one message to the department and the minister who leads it: do better.
