THE SOUTH AFRICAN HERITAGE RESOURCES INFORMATION SYSTEM (SAHRIS): DEVELOPMENT AND CHALLENGES THROUGH MANAGEMENT OF CULTURAL HERITAGE RESOURCES THROUGH AN INTEGRATED WEB-BASED PLATFORM

Abstract

[EN] The South African Heritage Resources Agency (SAHRA) is a statutory body created to implement the National Heritage Resources Act No.25 of 1999 and is responsible for the identification and management of the national estate of South Africa. In 2013, the South African Heritage Resources Information System (SAHRIS) was developed to create an inventory of the national estate and facilitate the management of heritage resources.The SAHRIS platform is an interactive system that provides a collaborate space through which government officials, heritage practitioners, developers and researchers can engage with the management of the national estate of South Africa. Core functions include an online application system, in which public users and governement officials collaborate and communicate; an archive of heritage sites and resources; protect heritage sites and resources that are threatened by development or mining activities; a collections management system for the effective management of heritage objects.Despite its progressive efficiency, users of SAHRIS encounter challenges such as difficult navigatibility due to it serving a variety of users and applications. Furthermore, although it is a public domain and should therefore allow free access to all records, privacy of certain documents and records is important in order to protect researchers’ interests and heritage resources from loitering and destruction. The advantage of a digital system is that it is work in progress and open to continuous improvement.