Gavin Kode

Gavin Kode is the Deputy Director-General: Provincial Public Works in the Western Cape Government (WCG) Department of Infrastructure. Provincial Public Works develops and maintains appropriate infrastructure and related services for the WCG and its purpose.

Gavin Kode is the Deputy Director-General: Provincial Public Works in the Western Cape Government (WCG) Department of Infrastructure. Provincial Public Works develops and maintains appropriate infrastructure and related services for the WCG and its purpose is to provide balanced building infrastructure that promotes integration, accessibility, sustainability, equity, environmental sensitivity, economic growth and social empowerment.

Following initial business and law undergraduate studies and being admitted as an attorney, Gavin specialised in tax law and gained significant experience in asset-based structured financing, corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, project finance and private equity in the merchant and investment banking arena. In 2013 he moved from Old Mutual Property to work by choice as a public sector property professional, largely because of the vast opportunities he sees in public sector property portfolios for creating growth and jobs, and enabling a resilient, sustainable, high-quality and inclusive working environment. He continues to drive private sector property asset management principles and practices in Public Works, with a specific focus on sustainability.

In August 2017, he was assigned to establish and lead the business continuity planning process for the WCG itself as a response to the then approaching water crisis. The programme had to prepare the WCG for the possible introduction of what became known as ‘Day Zero’ – the day when there would be no more water in the taps. The response had to develop and implement disaster plans for the service delivery mandates of the WCG, to reduce the water demand of the WCG as a consumer and to develop plans to ensure water supply to certain of its critical service delivery facilities, such as hospital and clinics, that had to continue to operate during the looming disaster.

The last-mentioned supply-side interventions of this programme was the focus of his PhD thesis in the Institute for Water Studies at the University of the Western Cape and is the subject matter of his presentation at the International Association of Hydrogeologists 2023 conference.