The Sunday News
Vincent Gono, Features Editor
WATER in Southern Africa’s 15 countries under the Southern African Development Community (SADC) has over the years become an increasingly scarce resource due to conspiring natural factors that can be traced to global changes in climate.
The precious liquid that gives life to both flora and fauna has fast become a source of competition and tensions among user groups and sectors on a local, national and sub-regional level.
The availability of water at regional level and the need to control it for the economic benefit of countries in the region can therefore never be overemphasised. What can be emphasised is the need for nation states to identify challenges and opportunities to the management of shared water resources in Southern Africa and develop sustainable and collective systems around which socio-economic growth can revolve.
A common denominator for all Southern African countries is that their more than 15 water resources are shared, scarce and vulnerable and if the water resources of the region are not managed wisely, water could prove to be a limiting factor for sustainable growth, as well as be a source of distrust between countries.
SADC countries share major rivers such as Congo, Zambezi, Limpopo, Save, Pungwe, Orange, Okavango, Buzi, Incomati, Maputo, Umbeluzi, Cunene, Cuvelai, Nile, Ruvuma and Imbulezi among others.
It is therefore in this light that the region has to pursue a joint investment approach as one of the lasting panaceas to the stressed energy sectors of member countries through the development and collective management of hydropower plants.
Regional socio-economic convergence can be achieved through shared watercourses such as the Zambezi River, which flows 2700 km from its sources on the Central African Plateau to the Indian Ocean and covers an area of about 1 360 000 km and includes territories in eight SADC countries which are Angola, Botswana, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Further to that, if proper water management systems are put in place, implemented and followed at national and regional levels they can be a rallying point around which regional economic convergence and robust industrial development can be attained.
Economically, the region can also work towards achieving the envisaged industrialisation roadmap while socially realising the UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDGs) of reducing poverty and hunger by 2030 through development of irrigation schemes in member countries’ communities to ensure food self-sufficiency and fight off malnutrition.
The experience from the field of development cooperation points to the fact that limited support to joint management initiatives, driven by the countries themselves, has a catalytic effect and assists in building confidence, trust and capacity. It is concluded that the capacity to manage water at national level needs to be strengthened so that it dovetails into international initiatives.
Emphasis on water and energy development in the region was raised last year at the 36th Ordinary Summit of Heads of State and Government in Lozitha, Swaziland when the then Sadc chairperson and Botswana President Dr. Seretse Khama Ian Khama was handing over the regional body’s chairmanship to King Mswatii III.
He expressed concern over the continued deterioration of water and energy resources in the region.
He said the lack of access to water was breeding food insecurity, inherent poverty and escalating poaching and illegal trade in wildlife.
And to direct the region’s attention the concerns he raised, Dr Khama convened three thematic workshops for food security and poverty eradication, enhanced access to energy and water and anti-poaching.
He noted the lack of communities’ capacity to deal with successive years of drought in the region as a result of climate change which he said was a reality that was grimly staring the globe in the face.
Dr Khama said there was need to move with speed and as a unit to counter the effects of drought through implementing strategies that would ensure communities in the region get the necessary shock absorbers through provision of water for irrigation.
“There is no doubt that collectivity in implementation of our programmes is the only option as it brings a win – win situation to all of us and that the vestiges of individuality can no longer further our interests,” he said.
He challenged the region to continue devising and implementing strategies and proposals to address and mitigate challenges of food security, poverty, water and energy crisis as well as illegal trade in wildlife.
During the last decade, the region has experienced two long periods of drought with a widespread impact on the economies and increasing poverty as a result.
Early this year, devastating floods induced by Cyclone Dineo struck the Eastern part of the region and countries with already fragile economies, such as Mozambique and Zimbabwe suffered in terms of loss of basic infrastructure lives, property and productivity.
The region’s natural climate variability continues to make management of available water resources a serious challenge that could be even greater with the impact of human induced climatic changes.
SADC Executive Secretary Dr. Stergomena Lawrence Tax said a five year Investment Plan for implementation of the SADC Regional Agricultural Policy (RAP) which sought to ensure long term food security and reduction of social and economic vulnerability had been finalized.
He said with the increasing regional population, demand for water for domestic consumption, agriculture and industrial production was growing and urged the region to strengthen the management systems of shared water resources for the benefit of the region with priority given to joint investments that also create regional socio-economic cooperation.
Current SADC chairman King Mswatii III emphasised the need for regional cooperation among member states.
He proposed timeframes to be set for programmes to enable participants to present milestones they have achieved during the next summit later this year.
On the energy challenges faced by the region, King Mswatii III said SADC needed to continue focusing on the priorities espoused by the Regional Indicative Strategic Development Plan (RISDP) for 2015-2020, with its three core pillars of the strategy and roadmap being industrialisation, competition and regional integration.
“Africans were not born to be poor. We are highly capable of becoming innovative and creating a first world status for our nations. We must, however, discard the tendency of failing to support one another,” he said.
Environment Africa country director for Zimbabwe Mr Barnabas Mawire felt that little had been done by the region to achieve the full potential of its water resources despite the countries having signed the SADC Protocol on shared watercourses.
He said although strides have been made towards achieving the laid down objectives of the protocol such as to promote a coordinated and integrated environmentally sound development and management of the shared watercourse a lot still needed to be done for the countries to start reaping the benefits.
“Management of water resources is generally weak across the region due to a fragmented and weak institutional and policy framework. This often leads to poor planning and utilization of the use of available resources,” said Mr Mawire.
He said much of the water in the shared watercourses that could be used for expansive irrigation and industrial production was underutilised and yet the countries were reeling in poverty.
“If you look at how many shared watercourses Mozambique and Zimbabwe have you will be shocked to find out that they have the largest number of shared watercourses with Mozambique having nine while Zimbabwe follows with six but the two countries are among the vulnerable to drought because they are not utilising the resources.
“Other countries share about five or three watercourses while others such as Lesotho and Malawi have one each,” he said.
It was Mr Mawire’s submission that the some of the SADC countries lacked the financial capacity to achieve the water – energy nexus – the interconnection between water and the energy sector while others lacked the political will to develop.
“The slow pace of implementing integrated management of water resources on the sub-regional level, in spite of the high-level commitment expressed in the SADC protocol, is partly due to limited cross sectoral and financial commitment on the national level,” he said.
He urged a stronger engagement of diplomatic instruments and channels in addition to the Ministries of Water saying it would be instrumental in facilitating planning and implementation of projects with regional dimensions.
Zimbabwe shares watercourses such as Buzi, Limpopo, Okavango, Pungwe, Save and Zambezi while Mozambique shares Buzi, Incomati, Limpopo, Maputo, Pungwe, Ruvuma, Save, Umbeluzi, and Zambezi.
Angola, Botswana and Namibia share the Okavango River Basin while Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and South Africa are under the Orange-Senqu River Commission.
Mr Mawire said SADC member states have failed to fully invest jointly in water and energy sectors and most of them were only realising the importance of the joint investment approach now as the case was with Mozambique and Zimbabwe on their joint management and establishment of a hydropower plant in the Pungwe River Basin.
The Pungwe Basin originates in the eastern highlands of Zimbabwe and flows eastwards through the coastal plain of Mozambique and reaches the Indian Ocean at the City of Beira. The basin has a total area of about 31,000 km², of which 95% is located in Mozambique with only 5% in Zimbabwe.
Prior to the recent signing of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between Mozambique’s Minister of Public Works Mr Carlos Bonete and Zimbabwe’s Environment, Water and Climate Minister, Cde Oppah Muchinguri Kashiri in Chimoio, in Zimbabwe’s part of the Pungwe basin, a significant development was the water supply to the City of Mutare and little else.
Minister Muchinguri Kashiri said it was refreshing that the communities would benefit from irrigation water as well as other domestic uses while the development of Pungwe hydropower plant was a national milestone that would go a long way in alleviating the country’s energy stress.
“Southern Africa has articulated a vision of sustainable economic growth and poverty alleviation to be achieved through regional integration and cooperation.
“The proper management of the region’s water resources could be a major driving force to fulfil this vision through the creation of cooperative frameworks and win-win scenarios,” she said.
Another joint water and energy investment project which SADC should expedite is the Grand Inga hydropower project in the Congo River Basin in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
The project is expected to generate more than 40 000 megawatts and is viewed as one of the major immediate regional energy scarcity solutions not only for the DRC but other SADC member states including Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Zambia.
The 15 SADC member states of Angola, Botswana, DRC, South Africa, Mozambique, Malawi, Lesotho, Swaziland, Tanzania, Mauritius, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Seychelles, Madagascar and Namibia have also been challenged to broaden the knowledge and participation of key decision-makers and the general public of the ongoing basin wide initiatives outside the water and energy sectors.
