In our efforts to make a greater impact and to meet our goals of becoming the most competitive city, one of our key approaches is to enhance our responsiveness to investors. This contributes immensely toward creating ease and reducing the cost of doing business in Durban. The Municipality has a policy mechanism to enable a rebate on property rates for commercial, industrial, and mixed-use property development across the municipal area.
The Economic Development Incentive Policy (EDIP) has been implemented since 2015 and offers new investors a discount on property rates. In the seven years of implementation, approximately R15 billion of investment was attracted to eThekwini Municipality. The discount provided to investors ranges from 10% to 100% off rates payable to the City based on a qualifying criterion.
The Policy objective is also to enhance economic activities in the spatially targeted areas, as well as encourage urban regeneration and local procurement which is paramount to increasing our GDP. Furthermore, the policy seeks to provide much needed relief to investors post the disasters that the City and the province have experienced in recent months. The economic downturn has also impacted immensely on business hence the much needed rebate on property taxes to enable the resuscitation of business, sustainability, and job creation.
Contact: Nuthan.Maharaj@durban.gov.za or Vuyokazi.Ndzimande@durban.gov.za
