An Integrated Development Plan, or IDP, is the five-year strategic plan every municipality must adopt under the Municipal Systems Act and review every year. It is the single most useful municipal document for a resident, and almost nobody reads it.

What is in it

  • An assessment of current conditions: population, backlogs, infrastructure condition, and what is not working
  • Development priorities and objectives for the five-year term
  • The capital projects planned, with locations, budgets and timeframes
  • The financial plan showing how it will be paid for
  • How the plan aligns with provincial and national programmes

Why it is worth reading

The IDP is where a municipality commits in writing to specific things in specific places. If a road, clinic site, water scheme or electrification project has been promised for your area, it should appear there with a budget attached. If it does not appear, the promise has no funding behind it.

It is also the document that public participation is built around. Municipalities must consult communities in preparing and reviewing the IDP, and those meetings are the formal opportunity to argue for a project in your area.

How it connects to the budget

The IDP and the annual budget are legally linked. A municipality may not budget for capital projects that do not appear in its IDP. That connection is what makes the IDP enforceable in practice rather than aspirational: if a project is in neither document, it is not happening this year.

How to hold a municipality to it

Compare the IDP with the annual report for the same year. The IDP states what was planned. The annual report states what was delivered. The gap between them, together with the Auditor-General’s findings on performance reporting, is the most direct evidence of whether a municipality does what it says.

Every municipality profile links its published IDPs alongside annual reports, audited financial statements and audit reports, all hosted by National Treasury.

Common questions

How often is the IDP updated?

A new IDP is adopted for each five-year council term, and reviewed and updated annually. The annual review is the version most municipalities publish each year.

Can residents change what is in the IDP?

Yes, through public participation. Municipalities are legally required to consult, and IDP meetings are where community priorities are formally recorded. Attendance is typically low, which means those who do attend carry disproportionate influence.

What is the difference between the IDP and the SDBIP?

The IDP is the five-year strategy. The Service Delivery and Budget Implementation Plan, or SDBIP, is the annual operational plan that translates the budget into quarterly targets for departments.

Figures on this page come from National Treasury, Statistics South Africa and the Auditor-General, as set out in the sources and methodology. Read the methodology