The focus of this Research Report is an evaluation of the National and Provincial Flagship events.
The South African Department of Arts and Culture (DAC) embarked on a strategy to reposition the arts, culture and heritage sector to address social cohesion, creation of sustainable jobs and ensuring social and economic development. The Mzansi Golden Economy (MGE) was launched in 2011 to unlock the South African cultural economy by making strategic investments to optimise the economic benefit of the Arts and to enhance the sector’s global competitiveness. An evaluation of the sub-categories of the cultural events that receive funding as part of the MGE programme was conducted, including National and Provincial Flagships, the focus of this first report. National and Provincial Flagship Projects are large and small-scale local, provincial and national events that promote the arts, culture and heritage and that contribute to local economic development, job creation and the development of audiences. National Flagship Projects are projects that have an impact on a national level and support the mandate and objectives of DAC. They are supported by DAC on a three-year renewable basis whereas Provincial Flagship Projects are supported on a one-year renewable basis.
The evaluation of the National and Provincial Flagships comprised a period of three funding cycles (2014-2015, 2015-2016 and 2016-2017). The events/ activities received different levels of funding and ranged from R85 065 to R20 000 000 for the last year in which DAC MGE funding was received. Thus, the funding is an annual estimation. In terms of the spatial distribution, the National and Provincial Flagships were hosted in all nine provinces with the most dominant provinces being Gauteng (22.9%), KwaZulu-Natal (14.3%), Eastern Cape (11.4%) and Western Cape (11.4%). The evaluation is based on an analysis of surveys undertaken with 13 National and Provincial Flagships events, in addition to documentary analysis of 30 of the 35 Flagships that provided reports to DAC.
The different types, size and spatial/ geographical spread of the National and Provincial Flagships indicate that the DAC MGE programme is meeting the broader objective of contributing to increased diversity of cultural offerings. While it is unclear whether the funding has led to existing Flagships to be upscaled, organisers have noted how the DAC MGE funding has permitted them to improve the quality of the event/ activity.
Most of the events were supported for the three year period which affirms that the DAC MGE programme is meeting the objective of creating opportunities for cultural events and activities to extent event timeframes. It is important to note, however, that the information (both the DAC documents available and the nature of the questions in the survey) does not permit an examination of trends over the three year period. Specifically, comparisons from year to year could not be undertaken. It is therefore not possible to examine whether the upscaling of existing events are taking place. This also applies to an analysis in relation to impacts on social and economic benefits (including whether the number of jobs created and if income generation are increasing over time).
Furthermore, most of the organisations/ businesses that organised the DAC MGE funded events/activities were mainly NPOs. Four hundred and thirteen permanent jobs are associated with the DAC MGE Flagship programme for the last year in which DAC MGE funding was received by the event organiser. These events are one of the main activities or the only activity the organisations are involved in, thus a significant contributor to job creation for the arts and cultural event organisations themselves. The more established events are also involved in other cultural events/activities, thus the Flagships associated with the DAC MGE funding are contributing more broadly to supporting cultural livelihoods and creating platforms and opportunities to develop South Africa’s cultural events hosting capacity.
These events also created opportunities for additional employment, ranging from 20 to 1 200 with an average number of 388 additional persons employed (in comparison to the 413 permanent jobs associated with the Flagships in total), albeit of a temporary nature. In terms of the profile of persons employed, the results indicate that they align to DAC MGE objectives, with most persons employed being locals and Africans, with women and youth benefitting as well. However, very few events/ activities created employment opportunities for disabled persons. The results in relation to job creation show that while employment generated from the hosting of the event/activity is largely temporary or casual in nature, these events/ activities are supporting livelihoods as intended by the DAC MGE, especially targeting historically disadvantaged groups and promoting job opportunities at the local level and within the arts and cultural event space. These events/ activities further provide opportunities for event-related service providers as well as stallholders/ exhibitors, who are primarily Black South Africans thus contributing to a key objective of the DAC MGE funding to support projects with economic and social benefits for the location. In addition to employment opportunities, the events/ activities created additional exposure to the creative and cultural industries for persons who were volunteers or participated in Work Integrated Learning (WIL), thus addressing an important objective of the MGE in relation to skills development opportunities. Several events/ activities also highlighted the importance of on-thejob skills development and training that is provided, contributing to enhanced quality of productions, a specific objective of this DAC MGE funded workstream.
Given the diversity of Flagships that are supported by the DAC MGE programme, it is clear that audiences throughout the country are being exposed to different types and genres of cultural events/ activities which is one of the objectives of the programme. However, it is important to note that neither the surveys nor the close-out reports captured disaggregated information on the attendees therefore it is not possible to examine audience diversity. Additionally, events/ activities do not account for how repeat visitors for multiple day events are considered, which is an important consideration when undertaking economic impact assessments. This will provide more accurate information to assess participation and attendance at DAC MGE supported events/activities.
An important objective of the DAC MGE funding is to enhance social cohesion by promoting diversity of content and audiences in specific locations which is being met through marketing efforts directed at local communities. However, responses for local, national and international media exposure were scanty. Very few events/ activities (23.1%) are leveraging free media exposure or are not monitoring media coverage of the DAC MGE funded event/ activity. Since very few Flagships provided media information (both in terms of documents submitted and responses to the survey), this suggests that media tracking needs to be improved to enable the broader DAC MGE objectives of ensuring exposure to the creative and cultural industries. Media exposure is critical to market the event/ activity as well as achieve the DAC MGE goal of increasing the audience and exposure that each production receives, as well as long-term economic and social benefits for the location as a result of profiling the event in national and international media.
The reliance on government sponsorships (43% of funding was DAC MGE funding), to sustain these events/ activities is of concern. Several of the larger events/ activities rely almost solely on this funding which may undermine the objectives of creating sustainable cultural events/ activities. This funding was also critical to leveraging additional sponsorships in many instances (76.9%). Several Flagships (84.6%) stated that they would not host the event without DAC MGE funding as the event would not be financially viable, with others indicating that would be difficult to host the event and that this funding is essential. A major challenge faced by event organisers was the timeous release of DAC MGE funding which is critical to the success of an event.
Very few respondents (23.1%) provided information on the company’s overall budget for this event/ activity and while the close-out reports are expected to include expenditure and income information, very few did. This again underscores the importance of DAC monitoring and evaluation, especially in relation to ensuring that beneficiaries are contractually obligated to provide the information required by DAC, and consequently providing more comprehensive data on the impact of DAC MGE funding in meeting the set objectives.
