News from the SA water sector July 2017

Abstract

Fluid Thoughts Fluid Thoughts Water and sanitation industrialisation – the promise of IPAP 2017 South Africa as a country, and southern Africa as a region, are emerging from the world’s highest impact el Niño event in twenty years. “a very important risk in the water and sanitation landscape is the absence at scale of a vibrant water private sector in South Africa. ” At home, we have been through one of the worst droughts in recent history, and for the Western Cape, the worst since 1904. We will require three consecutive years of reasonable rainfall to effect a full recovery. In addition, South Africa’s water balance continues to be at risk, with most models predicting a supply deficit of around 1 billion cubic metres by 2035 if our current high demand patterns continue unabated in spite of a supply increase of more than 16% on current and planned augmentation projects. This combined with the fact, that even in non-drought years, South Africa ranks 148 out of 180 countries with respect to water availability per capita, offers a very sobering picture.

Categories