Prof Mike Muller

Graduate School of Public and

Development Management

Wits University

Presentation given at IHP-HELP Centre for Water Law, Policy and Science, under the auspices of UNESCO, 21st June 2011

What is meant by water security? Household? Reliable services

Health

Community? Resilience to disasters

Vulnerability of economy

National? survival of the state and nation?

Environmental? Ecological survival, from local to planet

Framing the issue A definition of water security

‘the reliable availability of an acceptable quantity and quality of water for health, livelihoods and production, coupled with an acceptable level of water-related risks.’ Grey and Sadoff (2007).

Not the same as ‘food security’ and ‘energy security’, reliable access to sufficient supplies.

water security also captures destructive aspects of water floods and droughts

Water management is a complex business

Offtake for sugar mill and village

(return channel, warm treated

water, just downstream)

Onward flow to poor

people & neighbors

Water for nature conservation –

National park

Weir, interferes with

environmental function

Water for agriculture

– commercial cane

Flood line –

development

constraint

The regional water challenges

Southern African countries already water stressed

Likely to get worse, with climate and population

Conflict inevitable

Aggravating the challenges:-

External land and water grabbing ,

Biofuels promotion

Loss of ecosystem services making people poorer

Corruption will exacerbate situation

It’s already happening Conflict has happened:-

invasion of Lesotho by South Africa

Botswana and Namibia sabre-rattling over Okavango

Dams and displaced people are a major problem

China in Angola and Zambia

Colonising land and water as well as minerals

Corruption has undermined cooperation

Lesotho and elsewhere

Part of the problem ?

Is population pressure on water an issue?

Water stressed 1990

Water stressed 2025

Is drought, variability a problem?Droughts risk and vulnerability (economic loss, as a proportion of GDP density)

UNEP/GRID-Arendal, Droughts - risk and vulnerability (economic loss, as a proportion of GDP density), UNEP/GRID-Arendal Maps and Graphics Library,

Who has the water?

And is availabilitya problem?

Who has the water?

Country

Angola

Botswana

Lesotho

Malawi

Mozambique

Namibia

South Africa

Swaziland

Zambia

Zimbabwe

Country ????

Least water

Most water

Who has the water?

CountryWater

Availability

Angola 10510

Botswana 6820

Lesotho 1680

Malawi 1400

Mozambique 11320

Namibia 8810

South Africa 1110

Swaziland 4160

Zambia 9630

Zimbabwe 1550

M3/p/yr

South Africa 1110

Malawi 1400

Zimbabwe 1550

Lesotho 1680

Swaziland 4160

Botswana 6820

Namibia 8810

Zambia 9630

Angola 10510

Mozambique 11320

Least water

Most water

Source: UN WWDR 2006

COUNTRY Water m3/p/yrGaza strip 41Singapore 139Rwanda 610Egypt 790Kenya 930South Africa 1110Denmark 1120Korea, s 1450Eritrea 1470Ethiopia 1680China 2140Burundi 2190United Kingdom 2460Uganda 2470Swaziland 4160Botswana 6820Namibia 8810Zambia 9630Mozambique 11320DRC 23850

Who has the water?

Who uses their water?Country

Angola

Botswana

Lesotho

Malawi

Mozambique

Namibia

South Africa

Swaziland

Zambia

Zimbabwe

DRC

AVAILABILITY M3 P/C USE %

10510 0.2

6820 1

1680 2

1400 6

11320 0.3

8810 2

1110 31

4160 18

9630 2

1584 13

23850 0.03

Or is money the problem?

The Southern African challenge Low-equilibrium traps and poverty

Many of the traps are externally set

Hydropower and infrastructure blocks

Environmental conventions

External dependence

Conflict provoked

EX:Muller M, Fit for purpose: taking integrated water resource management back to basics Irrigation and Drainage Systems: Volume 24, Issue 3 (2010), Page 161.

DIMENSION

“PRAGMATIC”

RIO

“PRESCRIPTIVE”

DUBLIN

Economic

Nature of water

Priority of economic instruments

Priority setting

Role of private sector

Characterised as:-

Economic and social good

Economic instruments balanced

by social considerations

Within national economic

development policy

Major role for government,

recognition of private role

Developmental

Economic good

High priority for economic

instruments

Stakeholder participation,

economic instruments

High priority for role of private

sector, limited government

Washington Consensus

Institutional, national

Institutional objectives

Participatory approaches

Governance

Characterised as:-

Importance of national

development strategies

Where there is clear demand

Appropriate institutions

Public administration

Focus on “enabling

environment”

Heavy emphasis on participatory

approaches

Performance based institutions

New Public Management

Institutional, international:

Transboundary approaches

Institutionalisation of global

water

Characterised as:-

Basin specific approaches

United Nations system

Multilateralism continued

River basin organisations

World Water Council outside

inter-governmental domain

Retreat from multilateralism

Environmental

Infrastructure

Decision making

River basin organisation (RBO)

Characterised as:-

Infrastructure development, a

key element

Effective implementation and

coordination required

Manage “in basin context”

Balance needs of people and

environment

“Development” deleted

Emphasis on “full stakeholder

participation”

RBO the most appropriate entity

Ecosystem approach

Competing water

management

paradigms:

The differences

between Rio and

Dublin

Water’s Washington Consensus

Water’s Washington Consensus

So what are the real security challenges? Failure to develop the resource

Mozambique, Zambia, Angola

(Okavango, Zambesi)

Hydropower, agriculture,

Variability and uncertainty

Hydrological variability (floods and droughts)

Developmental uncertainty (Angola & Zambia worries)

Failure to develop the society

Domestic water security

Poverty

World potential and current hydropower production, 2004

How water resource development & management supports economies

Flow

TimeReliable Flow

Reliable Flow

Maximum flood flow

Maximum flood flow

Management and

Infrastructure interventions

Reliable

supplies =

More investment and

greater productivity

SA, a potential regional predator?

Must South Africa look to its neighbours to meet future water needs?

What are the regional cooperation and security implications?

1890s local springs

1902 Rand Water - Zuurbekom

1923 Vaal Barrage

1938 Vaal Dam

1982 Tugela-Vaal

pumped

transfer/storage

1998 Lesotho Highlands Phase 1a

2004 Lesotho Highlands Phase 1b

Evolution of SA economy’s water supply “footprint”

Next, the Zambezi?!

2020 Lesotho Highlands Phase 2

LHWP Phase II (Polihali Dam)

Use of acid mine drainage

Thukela-Vaal transfer (Phased Mielietuin

& Jana Dams)

Zambezi-Vaal transfer

Orange-Vaal transfer (Boskraai Dam with phased pipelines)

Desalination of seawater

Mzimvubu-Vaal transfer

0

5

10

15

20

25

0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800

Marg

inal C

ost

-U

RV

(R

/m3)

Volume (million m3/a)

Vaal River Augmentation Options

Legend

(0.85) - Unit energy requirementkWh/m3 of raw water

(13.2)

(4.2)

(4.4)

(3.4)

(2.4)(2.5)

(0.0)

Vaal River system – Zambesi next?

1890s local springs

1902 Rand Water - Zuurbekom

1923 Vaal Barrage

1938 Vaal Dam

1982 Tugela-Vaal

pumped

transfer/storage

1998 Lesotho Highlands Phase 1a

2004 Lesotho Highlands Phase 1b

Evolution of system’s water “footprint” - waste

1970s Waste

from

Gauteng

to Crocodile

2010 Waste to

Lephalale &

Limpopo

Next, the Zambezi?!

2020 Lesotho Highlands Phase 2

Is SA a potential predator?

Costs Lesotho Ph2 R6/kl

Wastewater to Lephalale R8/kl (mainly transport)

Zambesi water R23/kl?

Desalination at coast R4/kl and falling

Water for the economy Singapore 150kl/person/year

South Africa 1200 kl/person/year

Some real issues 20 years, since Rio, countries been denied access to

infrastructure funding (Water’s Washington Consensus)

Constrained by internationally imposed environmental conventions (e.g. RAMSAR)

Denied pathways that rich countries used

Ignored evidence that environment can be rehabilitated

Kuznets curve

Rhine, Danube, US Great Lakes

Hydropower

Benefits of cooperation

LESOTHO: sale of gravity and rental of land (not water)

15% of government budget ,

SWAZILAND: cooperation treaty

aid for agriculture prize (LUSIP) (alternatives to sugar ?)

MOZAMBIQUE: Cabora Bassa

Funded electrification of country

ZIMBABWE, ZAMBIA:

still getting power from Kariba

TCTA Trip to Katse and Mohale

Feb/Mar 2003 30

Infrastructure project impacts ….

Katse Dam, Lesotho

TCTA Trip to Katse and Mohale

Feb/Mar 2003 31

…. can be mitigated : Mohale resettlement

Cooperation in water in 2002…

2002: The WSSD WaterDome, birthplace of historical Incomaputoagreement

“Swaziland, Mozambique, and South Africa made water history for the African continent when they signed a water-sharing agreement governing the use of two of their shared rivers. The Interim IncoMaputo Agreement, which involves the Incomati and Maputo rivers, provides significant benefits to all three nations. The agreement immediately unlocked financial support for a major new irrigation development in Swaziland, the Lower Usuthu Smallholder Irrigation Project, which will create direct employment for 10,000 people through the development of over 11,000 hectares, providing much needed poverty relief in this area of otherwise limited economic potential.”

… produces food and livelihoods

LUSIP, Swaziland, in 2010

About water wars...

“The wars of the next century will be for water”,

“unless we change the way we manage water”.

Ismael Serageldin, 1996

Former VP Sustainable Development, World Bank

Founder of the World Water Council

Head of the Alexandria Library

Napoleon’s African water management lesson:

Under a good government, the Nile gains on the desert

Under a bad government, the desert gains on the Nile

Conclusions To achieve water security, need

Investments in infrastructure to store and transport water, treat and reuse waste water

robust institutions, able to take and implement decisions information and the capacity to predict, plan and cope

Many societies want to move beyond water security to take advantage of benefits derived from wise water use “water for growth and development” “land and water grabs” and threat, while Biofuels displace food ... or Better live & livelihoods as well as products and profits?

Much of Africa still needs to achieve basic water security But also needs growth and development

Conclusions Perceptions are often wrong, conclusions not

supported by evidence

Lead to inappropriate policy reponses

In world of sovereign and dependent countries,

Southern Africa dependent over past two decades

External policy has ignored local preferences

Imposed external preferences

Ignored historical evidence

Conclusions Challenges

Financial resources

Climate variability and change

Response

Help region to manage water in support of its sustainable development

Support infrastructure development

Some climate funding to water management

Will

Help countries to achieve development goals,

Make them more resilient to eventual climate change

Thank you!