WATER CRISIS

The country of South Africa has been stricken by the affects from the long standing apartheid, which was racial segregation during the Dutch colonial rule. The legislation classified inhabitants into four racial groups and segregated residential areas from 1948- 1976 (apartheid.) To the devastation that diseases such as HIV/AIDS and TB have caused. Now another crisis looms in the distance; Water. As more and more people migrate into a popular city called Durban, from rural villages the pressure for the city to meet the water demands is ever increasing.

 

Durban is the second largest city in South African province KwaZulu-Natal. According to UCL data it forms part of the eThekwini metropolitan municipality that has a population of 3,026,974 and is 885 sq. miles. Durban is famous for being the busiest port of South Africa. One would think that a booming metropolitan city should never lack access to the most basic necessity of life, such as water. Yet it does.

 

South Africa’s tap water is among the best in the world (Department of Water Affairs and Forestry). The eThekwini Municipal drinking water quality is checked monthly, however its outdated infrastructure and a small number of skilled staff members have contributed to higher levels of pollution in dams and rivers. The preventative measures are not holding up. Dams are either in the process of being built or are falling down. There are many influential reasoning that attribute to this bulging water crisis in Durban.

 

Climate change, poor management, and lack of basic sanitation are the major factors.Climate change has affected water supplies within the region. Rains that usually come and supply the country's water has now come infrequently. It is difficult to measure and expect water because you depend on the amount of rain that falls. The country usually has a couple of wet years followed by drier years, but it has never been this bad. “The total rainfall for last year, for this region, was the fourth lowest on record. The Durban dams at the beginning of this year were on average 20 percent lower than at the start of 2010” (Savides).

 

Poor management is another factor. Much of the water have vanished through aging, leaking infrastructures and illegal water connections. South African water utility companies are losing billions of dollars through lost and stolen water. 35 percent of the water is being lost or stolen (Savides). “SA was facing a revenue shortfall of R2.6 billion to address its national water infrastructure backlog, he said. The country also had a poor and unsustainable billing system, with some people not paying for water. This meant that local authorities were owed more than R1bn for water that was used but not paid for” (Khumalo). Water metering is a joke because some municipals cannot keep record of how much water is being used due to broken and leaking pipes. Many of the water systems have reached the end of their design life and need to be replaced.

 

Water borne diseases are steadily increasing due to lack of basic sanitation. Many of the water sources are being polluted by human and animal wastes. “Humanitarian News and Analysis,” stated in 2008, half of the municipal water supplies surveyed in Western Cape Province, on the country's south coast, had high levels of the potentially deadly E. coli bacteria, according to a study released by the provincial DWAF. Water must be properly be disinfected and purified before use. Some areas are so bad that the state has to issue boil alerts. “Humanitarian News and Analysis,” stated that in 2008 about five million people lacked access to water and fifteen lacked access to basic sanitation. A deficiency in quality drinking water leads to health problems. South Africa rivers are not big therefore the contaminants are heavily concentrated. Citizens are getting sick because their only water source is straight from the polluted rivers.

 

If water supplies are not saved or does not stay purified in the future, then the city of Durban will experience more deaths and a civil war might even break out. South Africa needs to tackle the country’s water challenges by investing in outside help from a trusting advanced foreign aid that will not end up screwing them over in the end. Also adopting new technology techniques will help with the infrastructure. Water is vital for life. We need it to cook, clean, wash our bodies, and for agriculture. If water disappears so does the human and animal population.