In nine weeks, residents of Buffalo City will go to the polls to elect a new local government.
We will hear the usual promises — jobs, investment, SMME development, better services, growing the economy.
But before we get carried away with election slogans, one question I want to ask is: What does it actually cost to do business in Buffalo City?
Think about a small butcher, baker or dressmaker operating somewhere in Mdantsane.
The business might employ five or six people. It buys meat from a supplier, pays rent, electricity, water, wages, transport, security and everything else that comes with keeping the doors open.
If things go well, the owner makes a modest profit and perhaps employs another person.
But let’s look closer at the bill. From 1 July, BCM implemented its 2026/27 tariff increases.
Electricity went up by 11.10%, water by 8.33%, sewerage and refuse by 4.70%, while assessment rates increased by 2%.
None of these increases exist in isolation. For a household, an increase in electricity is painful.
For a business that relies on refrigeration, cooking equipment, machinery and lighting, electricity is a crucial input into production.
The same applies to water and refuse.
And then there are the costs that don’t necessarily appear on the municipal account.
What does unreliable infrastructure cost a business? A generator. Fuel. A water tank. Repairs to a vehicle travelling on poor roads. Stock lost because refrigeration failed.
A customer who decides to shop somewhere else because getting to your shop has become a tale of inconveniences like potholes.
These are not all costs that can fairly be placed at the municipality’s door. Businesses have always had operating costs.
But local government shapes a significant part of the environment in which those costs are incurred.
That is what makes this conversation important. We often speak about SMMEs as though the biggest problem is that they need funding.
Of course, access to finance matters. But what happens after the funding arrives?
If I give a small business R100,000 and it operates in an environment where the cost of electricity, water, transport, security and compliance keeps eating into its margins, how much of that money is actually helping the business grow?
Perhaps the better question for the next administration is not simply: How many businesses can we fund? It is more like: How much does it cost a business to survive in Buffalo City?
Now that is an entirely different conversation. Because economic development is not only about attracting a large investor to the city.
It is also about whether the person running a five-person business can become a ten-person employer.
Economic development is not only about attracting a large investor to the city.
It is also about what happens to the small businesses already here.
The butcher, baker, dressmaker in Mdantsane should be able to look at an empty shop down the road and think, maybe I can afford that one day.
The person running a small workshop should be thinking about the next machine, not the next electricity bill.
A salon owner should be worrying about getting more clients, not whether the water will be running when they arrive.
That is how businesses grow. Not all at once, and of course not through government funding alone, but one customer, one machine, one employee and eventually one additional premises at a time.
Buffalo City needs businesses that can grow. And businesses that grow create the jobs we keep promising during elections.
So as political parties prepare their manifestos, perhaps they should spend less time telling us that they support SMMEs and more time explaining exactly how they intend to make it easier, and cheaper, to operate one.
Because sometimes economic development is not about giving a business more money.
Sometimes it is about stopping the business from losing money simply because it is trying to operate here.
>creditparsans<Buzani is a business consultant and youth empowerment advocate, as well as a founding member of an award-winning SME and of the vibrant Mdantsane entrepreneur network Kasi Konversations
