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South African Public Works Minister Stella Sigcau on Friday called on the built environment industry to start giving health and safety in the construction sector "the priority it deserves".

Sigcau, speaking at the Council for the Built Environment's Gauteng workshop, in Midrand, was referring to the recent collapse of bridges and buildings, such as the Brooklyn Mall and the Centurion Shopping Mall in Pretoria.

"It is a known fact that the quality of work by some of our built environment professionals is deteriorating. It is a very sad day when lives are lost because our professionals compromise on their designs to cut costs," she commented.

The minister also urged engineers to broaden their traditional roles if they are to contribute to meeting current socioeconomic needs, and added that definite relationships exist between employment opportunities, available skills, entrepreneurship and the use of small-scale enterprises in the creation and maintenance of assets.

"The construction strategies that are adopted can be used to address social and economic needs and concerns and, depending upon how they are structured, to facilitate the economic empowerment of marginalised sectors of society in a focused manner. Thus, the process of constructing assets can be just as important as the provision of the assets themselves," Sigcau stated.

Choices in the technologies, construction and manufacturing method determine the number of employment opportunities generated for a particular activity or process, where employment opportunities are created, and what kind of enterprises can execute contracts.

"The challenge to engineers is, in the first instance, to understand the potential which construction projects have for delivering socioeconomic deliverables, and, thereafter, to use their skills, knowledge and creativity to realise these deliverables."

Sigcau pointed out that, during the budget vote earlier this year, she identified several initiatives to promote the built environment sector, improve its overall performance and grow its contribution to the gross domestic product.

The application and implementation of these strategies, she said, should bring about a transformed built environment, which is aligned to the socioeconomic imperatives of government and the country.

"This strong desire to transform our industries is propelled by the changing global forces which bring with them both opportunities and threats alike. Unless we change our archaic view of doing business in South Africa and unless we overhaul short-sighted business management practices, our industries will lose sight of the benefits of harnessing the rich South African diversity," Sigcau noted.

"It was with this conviction in mind that I recently launched two separate, but interlinked, processes which will lead to the construction and property charters in June next year. Both sectors are characterised by a lack of skills necessary to take this country forward."