A taskforce has been created by a local government association to investigate the potentially harmful, impacts of mining development on regional communities.

The Eyre Peninsula Local Government Association is putting together a group to find out what the social impacts of about 15 mining projects may be.

The projects are all slated to take place in and around the Eyre Peninsula region of South Australia.

The taskforce will also look at the role local government should take in enabling community welfare in the face of mineral resource development.

Eyre Peninsula Local Government Association president Julie Low said; “the taskforce will look at, not just its infrastructure but also social services and the community and all of those issues,”

“You know already we're struggling to meet community expectations, and mining will bring that other extra dimension - so this is one way to help us understand what we have to do, and our role.”

Representatives from the eleven councils in the Eyre Peninsula, the mining industry and relevant Government departments made the decision to form an official group at a roundtable discussion last week.

The LGA president said now is the time to plan for all the impacts of mining activity, as the region gets ready to ramp up its resource-gathering.

“This will be looking at what we've got now, but how we can create a collaborative approach to solving some of the issues that exist,” Ms Low said.

“We know that we need more power, we know that we need an assurance of water, we know if there's going to be an increase in jobs, we need more housing.”

She says the group will match a similar taskforce investigating the Olympic Dam mine expansion.