Johannesburg – AfriForum has launched a landfill site audit project for 2026 amid mounting evidence that South Africa’s waste management system is failing.
The system was buckling under the weight of weak enforcement, unrealistic planning, and collapsing municipal capacity.
AfriForum announced on Friday, 30 January 2026, that the landfill audit will take place nationwide in February, and the results will be released later this year.
AfriForum’s landfill audit has been conducted annually since 2014 and assesses whether municipal landfills comply with basic legal and operational requirements for responsible waste management.
Meanwhile, AfriForum said it was drafting formal comments on the Department of Forestry, Fisheries, and the Environment’s draft National Waste Management Strategy 2026.
AfriForum’s submission will focus on the growing gap between policy ambition and governance reality, including the repackaging of failed targets, weak enforcement mechanisms, and the continued neglect of municipal landfill sites.
“The department’s draft waste strategy acknowledges that landfill airspace is running out, yet it simply repeats five-year-old diversion targets that were never close to being achieved,” said Marais de Vaal, AfriForum’s Advisor for Environmental Affairs.
“Without fixing enforcement and accountability at municipal level, these targets are meaningless.”
The consequences of this failure are already most visible in Gauteng, where experts warn that remaining landfill airspace could be exhausted within a few years due to poor management and limited alternatives.
“Despite this looming crisis, the draft strategy offers no structural reforms to address the root causes of landfill failure in major metros,” said AfriForum.
“These governance failures are no longer theoretical but are already producing visible consequences on the ground.”
To raise public awareness of what is at stake, AfriForum said it has produced a documentary on the looming landfill airspace crisis in Gauteng.
The documentary will be available in March.
“Our message is clear. South Africa does not need more strategies on paper,” De Vaal said.
“It needs enforcement of existing legislation and accountability when obligations are not complied with.
“Until that happens, AfriForum will continue to monitor, expose, and challenge the waste management failures that threaten communities and the environment.”
Watch the trailer for Gauteng’s landfill time bomb here.
