Towards developing a domestic water security index for South Africa

Abstract

The primary input to our water resources is rainwater and South Africa’s rainfall is unevenly distributed in time and space. It is estimated that 8% of our water source areas provide 50% of the available water. Combined with climatic patterns, topography, spatial distribution of the population and industries, South Africa is inherently a water scarce country. This is worsened by an increasing shift towards overall lower rainfall and higher evapotranspiration in southern Africa. Locally, our rainfall is highly seasonal and variable in time and space, coupled with a potential evaporation rate that is generally greater than rainfall. South Africa gets most of its water supply from surface storage. Surface storage systems comprise approximately 5 000 registered dams, 3 832 of these are small dams serving farms and municipalities and imported water from Lesotho. The few low-capacity desalinisation plants (brackish groundwater and seawater) are localised. Because of the complexity of our geology, the ground is widely but unevenly distributed.

Authors

Categories