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Integrated Approaches to Efficient Water Use in South Africa

Dhesigen Naidoo & George Constantinides
Department of Water Affairs and Forestry, Republic of South Africa

It remains difficult to address any resource issue in South Africa without first considering the impact of the past 300 hundred years in general and the past fifty years in particular. The formal Apartheid years (1948 – 1994) and the preceding 250 years has left a legacy of inequitable access and development of resources. The current profile of water access and servicing in South Africa can to large measure be explained by this policy.

Some key features of the current profile are:

1. Prioritisation of water for commercial agriculture. Agriculture currently uses approximately 54% of available water primarily servicing white owned farms. This constitutes more than 83% of arable land. In many instances the question of most beneficial use of water arises.
2. The location of major industry far away from the major water river systems and the expansion of those industrial developments beyond the capacity of the existing water supply. This has meant that large expensive interbasin transfer schemes have become popular water solutions in the South African environment.
3. The third key characteristic is probably the most visible consequence of the social engineering that was Apartheid and that is the differential domestic servicing within the paradigm of South Africa’s unique class system based on race. The net result is that we have reasonable reticulation efficiency in the white suburbs and quite the opposite in black townships where minimum nightflows of greater than sixty percent are not at all uncommon. In addition it is estimated that out of our population approximately 40 million people, 9 to 12 million of those people do not have reasonable access to potable water.

This describes the environment within which the South African water industry operates and some of the key factors that advised the development of the new water legislative framework for the new democratic South Africa. The cornerstones of this legislative framework are two recently promulgated acts – the Water Services Act (108 of 1997) that informs all decision-making around treated water and the National Water Act (36 of 1998)

The key features of the acts are:

1. The naming of the Minister as the custodian of all waters and water resources in South Africa on behalf of the South African people. This implies that the concept of water ownership and water rights fall away and rights of access to water and the resource have to be secured through a mechanism of fixed period conditioned licences for water use.
2. A new governance regime for water based on the catchment model has been introduced in a manner that allows maximum participation within the subsidiarity concept.
3. The embracing of water conservation and demand management as key drivers toward efficient water use.

WATER CONSERVATION AND DEMAND MANAGEMENT PARADIGM as the key driver to promote EFFICIENT WATER USE.

The realities of the new democratic South Africa necessitate improved management of our limited economic and water resources. South Africa is a developing country that is water scarce and water stressed. The implementation of WC/WDM paradigm is essential not only for the sustainability of water resources and the environment but also for economic efficiency and social development. The performance paradigm for water resource management in South Africa is currently changing significantly through the recognition of the principles of Integrated Resource Planning (IRP) which recognises the opportunities of WC/DM and the need to focus on the consumers.

Water resource planning in South Africa was, until recently, completely supply management driven. This was based on developing new water resources to meet water demand projections. The demand projections were often extrapolations of past trends. Demand analysis of existing water usage was ignored. Detail demand analysis was limited with very little understanding on the drivers of future demand and even less recognition and appreciation of existing inefficient water use. The objective was to meet the perceived growth in demand by developing the most cost effective water augmentation scheme. This approach ignored that the most cost effective water augmentation scheme may not be the most effective and efficient solution for the consumers, users, environment and society in general.

Another characteristic of the previous paradigm in South Africa (also consistent with the conventional international paradigm) is the conservation of water by preventing the waste of water to the ocean. This often meant the allocation of all available water resources to consumers and users with few regulations and restrictions associated with water permits. Consequently a large percentage of consumers use water inefficiently, particularly in the agriculture sector, often at the cost of the government due to subsidised water schemes. Furthermore this policy does not promote social equity as it is does not adequately consider the rights of new consumers and future generations.

WC /DM paradigm for Water Services Institutions

Until recently, Water Boards, Local authorities, and Services Councils were relatively unregulated by national government with regards to their functions to deliver water services. One of the major issues which made water services less important from a water resource perspective was the fact that less than 10% of the total water resources is used by the urban/domestic sector. This, however, is misleading because the development of future water augmentation measures over the last decade and for the future is directly related to the increase in demand of this sector. There is an acceptance in the South African context that the agriculture and mining sectors are moving into negative growth patterns.

The new paradigm requires that service providers become accountable and responsible to their consumers. This is not only because of the water scarcity constraints but also in terms of optimising economic efficiency and meeting the service delivery backlogs, which have accrued during the Apartheid years. Water institutions in the past have not been adequately held accountable for their performance. This combined with the social political past has resulted in significant financial losses and varying levels of services between communities.

The paradigm of WC/DM will shift the focus to the consumer by striving to achieve economic efficiency in order to ensure sustainable and affordable water services as well as allow the reallocation of water resources and capital infrastructure capacity from inefficient usage to meet the water demands of the new consumers.

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