Social Development
- Whether his Department funds any programme in the Central Karoo area for (a) youth development, (b) drug and alcohol abuse and (c) rehabilitative services; if not, why not; if so; (i) what is the nature, (i) commencement date, (iii) budget allocated and (iv) how is the community made aware of such programmes;
- whether measures are in place to provide future initiatives of this nature in the Central Karoo area; if not, why not; if so, what are the relevant details?
(1)(a) The Department funds a variety of NGOs which render services to youth, in addition the Ministry recently hosted the Youth Skills Tranfer Programme in the region, which facilitated 66 young people gaining entrepreneurial skills.
(b) The Department has no funded drug and alcohol abuse programmes in the Central Karoo area. BADISA is an organisation funded by the Children and Families program in the Department and the services provided to families include brief interventions and referrals to the appropriate resources where substance abuse is identified.
The Department own services in the Central Karoo provides early intervention services that entails the screening, assessment and motivational interviewing of individuals, group interventions focusing on early recovery skills and relapse prevention as well as family interventions that includes educational programs and parenting skills. Aftercare services are provided with a focus on relapse prevention and integrating the service user back to communities after completion of treatment.
Service users have access to inpatient treatment at Toevlug, a treatment centre located in Worcester. The Department subsidises this facility for 240 bed spaces. Furthermore, service users may also be referred to the Departmental treatment centre, De Novo located in Kraaifontein for inpatient treatment.
(c)The Department has not been able to identify an organisation with the necessary expertise and experience to provide a substance abuse program in the Central Karoo area.
(2)The Department is aware of the gap in terms of funded partners in the Central Karoo area and are looking into identifying organisations with the skills necessary to implement services in the substance abuse field.
