Zambezi Water Project and South African proposals to transport Zambezi water to quench its thirst by John McCullum Water, the “white gold” of Lesotho, will soon be sold to South Africa – the kingdom’s neighbour on all fronts.
Lesotho will be the first country in southern Africa to sell large quantities of its waters across its frontiers.
Lesotho is presently building the Lesotho Highlands Water Project, a huge venture which will eventually transfer almost half of the country’s water- up to 115 cubic kilometres – to South Africa’s Vaal river via a network of dams and tunnels, while producing electrical power for its consumption. The Highlands project is one of many water projects being considered in the drought-prone southern African region. Member states of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) are currently discussing a proposed Protocol on Shared Watercourses in the SADC Region.
The draft protocol -expected to be signed in August this year- will set the stage for agreements between SADC countries to share water, including the possibility of transfer of water from one place to another, and sale to other countries.
The first steps, taken by SADC and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in 1985, led to the Zambezi River Action Plan (ZACPLAN).
The plan’s purpose was to set up a system to manage the entire Zambezi river basin in a sustainable, coordinated, and environmentally sound way.
At an April 1993 SADC workshop in Livingstone, Zambia, delegates requested that ZACPLAN be broadened to cover all river basins in SADC.
This decision led to the development of the draft protocol.
Many other proposals are also being considered, largely focusing on the Zambezi river or its tributaries, but also the Cunene and Okavango rivers.
Water transfer schemes include Botswana’s North-South Carrier, Zimbabwe’s Matebeleland Proposals to tap more sources of hydropower will now include the Batoka and Mupata gorges on the Zambezi and the Ruacana Falls on the Cunene, in addition to expanding existing facilities at Kariba and Kafue.
Overall, the amount of water which the SADC countries would like to take from the Zambezi is equivalent to some 80 percent of the water flowing over Victoria Falls each year. According to the first-ever State of the Environment Report on Southern Africa, at least one SADC country – Botswana – will not have enough water to meet demand by 2025.
By then, the country’s population is expected to more than double to 3.4 million people, making it hard to provide for all its domestic, industrial and agricultural water needs from its own sources.
Other countries – Namibia, Malawi, Zimbabwe and Swaziland – face water shortages in less than 50 years if present population growth and water use trends continue. The biggest shortage though, will be in SADC’s large neighbour, and possible eleventh member, South Africa. Already classed as “water-stressed,” South Africa will have used all its own water by 2025, including the large amounts transferred from Lesotho.
Much of the SADC region already struggles through the dry season annually, and spring prayers for rain go back farther than living memory.
People understand the hardships of thirst, the pain of watching cattle die by their thousands in parched, dusty fields, and the anxious wait for the first rains.
Yet statistically water is plentiful throughout SADC.
The Zambezi River, fed by eight of the 10 SADC countries, carries vast amounts of water to the ocean each year, owe 200 cu km or more than 15 limes the 101 😉 1 regional water use.
Countries such as Angola, Tanzania Zambia, and especially Mozambique have vast supplies of water, renewed each year, which seem almost limitless in comparison to current usage. Most of the water used in the SADC region is for farm irrigation, according to the report. Over 10 cu km of the 14 cu km used annually in SADC is for irrigation, almost three-quarters of the total use. After irrigated agriculture, most of the water is used in urban areas – in homes and industries.
Rural homes use water too but much less than those in towns and cities. Livestock watering, mining and electricity generation account for the rest.
As the population grows, currently at more than three percent annually in SADC, and more people move to towns and cities, more water will be needed for urban households. The increasingly industrialising economy will also require significant increases in water. The growing population will also need more food, so irrigation water needs will also increase substantially. These will be the main users in 2025.
Much of the water used for irrigation tends to be wasted either through evaporation while being sprinkled or by putting far more into the ground than crop roots can use. Current estimates show that well over half the water used in irrigation is wasted.
Some member states have made moves to cut back on water use and save it for the future. Botswana has an air-cooled electrical power plant.
A few major cities recycle some of their water.
Windhoek, the Namibian capital, can recycle almost one-quarter of its waste water and Harare, Zimbabwe, can recycle up to 10 percent. Many places practise water harvesting, making use of rainwater that falls on roofs.
Like the Zambezi, many of the region’s rivers and lakes are shared, and no one country can lay claim to them. Most of the major lakes are split by one or more national borders, with the two largest -Victoria and Tanganyika
– Also shared with non-
SADC countries. Eleven of the 15 largest rivers are also shared between at least two countries, including some outside SADC.
The SADC protocol on shared watercourses will provide a way to manage the shared rivers and lakes so that access to water is equitable to all countries and the environment is protected. Agreements for sharing have been made in the past according to the so-called Helsinki Rules, but these are very general, for use in any part of the world.
They were also developed before a strong of awareness of environmental impacts had emerged globally.
The timing of the SADC protocol is excellent, planners says, because a number of countries are interested in sharing water, particularly the drier countries in the region. Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia already have extensive water management systems, while other member states are also developing their water resources.
The main projects include dams for electric power generation or collection of water, or transfer systems such as canals, pipelines or boreholes for bringing groundwater to the surface. Namibia’s Eastern National Water Carrier (ENWC) includes a complex network of dams, boreholes, canals and pipelines to bring water to major cities and population centres. Namibia plans to eventually connect the ENWC to the Okavango river.
River and lake scientists are now deeply concerned over possible negative environmental effects of dams and water transfers within SANE.
Dams change the environment completely. Huge floodplains far downstream of the dams, such as the Marromeu at the mouth of the Zambezi, have been drying up because of the water storage at big dams like Kariba and Cahora Bassa.
The floodplains’ rich grazing has been destroyed and the many animals that used to live there are gone.
Several fish species have disappeared.
Large-scale water transfers are less studied in the SADC area, and there are fears that proposed schemes could allow alien species, such as bilharzia-hosting snails, water hyacinth and fish to move from one river or lake to another, causing serious local problems or even extermination of local species.
up in dams, already seriously negative environmental impacts could worsen. Some of these problems do not have to happen
In Namibia, a dam has been built that allows operators to simulate a natural flood to preserve the environment downstream. People are also affected by dams and water transfers. Water that is lost downstream may be needed by others for drinking, farming or even industrial use. Flooding by dams may force people to move permanently from their homes as happened with the Tonga people. They were forced to move from the banks of the Zambezi river when Lake Kariba was filled about 35 years ago.
The problem of water scarcity and transfer is not, however, unique to Southern Africa. By the year 2025, one out of three people on earth will live in countries plagued by “water stress” or chronic water scarcity, according to a recent study by Population Action International (PAl).
“Fresh water that is renewed by rain and snowfall is a finite resource in a world of growing demand,” says Robert Engelman, PAl’s population and environment programme director. (SARDC)
The State of The Environment Report 011 Southern Africa, scheduled to come out August this year, is a joint effort of three partners – the Southern African Research and Documentation Centre (SARDC), the World Conservation Union Regional Office for Southern Africa (IUCN-ROSA) and the SADC Environment and Land Management Sector
