Mkhambathini Local Municipality (KZN226)

Description: The Mkhambathini Local Municipality is a Category B municipality located along the south-eastern boundary of the uMgungundlovu District in KwaZulu-Natal. It is the second-smallest municipality of seven in the district. It consists of seven wards, with a large part of the municipality being rural in nature and underdeveloped.

Mkhambathini has several comparative advantages. It is well located in relation to Durban and Pietermaritzburg and adjoins Cato Ridge, a potential industrial node. The N3, which is identified in the Spatial Growth and Development Strategy as a Provincial Corridor, runs east-west through the central part of the municipal area.

Significant portions of the municipality fall within the Valley of a Thousand Hills (with Table Mountain a major landmark), an area with high potential for ecotourism, and in the Midlands Mist Belt, which has a well-established agricultural economy. Mkhambathini is an isiZulu word derived from eMkhambathini, which means ‘the place of acacia trees’.