South Africa is a water-scarce country and the 30th driest country in the world. With population growth and increasing droughts linked to climate change, water management is becoming increasingly important. A lack of clean, fresh water has a negative impact on people’s health and on the amount of food that can be grown.

Agricultural economist Saul Ngarava studied 1,184 households in South Africa’s North-West, Northern Cape and Eastern Cape provinces to find out which types of water management led to better water, energy and food security. He found that the best results occurred where water supplies were democratically managed jointly by different organizations.

How is water managed in South Africa?

Water management is governed by the Constitution, which states that “everyone has the right to access to sufficient food and water.” It also assigns different responsibilities related to water management to different levels of government.

On one end of the spectrum, the national government manages all water resources. On the other end, the local government is responsible for supplying households with clean water and disposing of wastewater and sewage.

The National Water Act of 1998 provides for the management of South Africa’s scarce water resources through various institutions at the local level: water catchment management authorities, water user associations, international bodies and the Water Tribunal.

The Water Services Act of 1997 stipulates that these institutions should ensure that everyone has access to basic water and sanitation services.

Why are water use regulations important?

Water promotes development and can help create jobs and reduce poverty. Water is essential to national planning and therefore it is crucial that it is managed properly.

In South Africa, there are different arrangements for water management: bottom-up and top-down. The two I have studied are the water users association and the catchment partnership.

There are 43 water user associations in South Africa – formal, top-down associations of individual water users. One example is a large-scale irrigation scheme that supplies water to commercial, emerging and smallholder farmers and their surrounding towns and villages in key agricultural areas. I studied the Vaalharts Water User Association, which covers the Taung and Magareng agricultural areas and stretches across the North West and Northern Cape provinces.

Water user associations typically have extensive infrastructure, which can include 100 kilometers of irrigation canals and pipelines. They are primarily targeted at commercial farmers who use this shared irrigation system, and although they provide water to all households in the farming region, they are largely subject to farmers’ regulations.

A catchment partnership is an informal, voluntary collaboration between several organisations with common interests. I studied the Umzimvubu Catchment Partnership in Matatiele in the Eastern Cape. It consists of more than 30 organisations, including the local municipality, the non-profit organisation Environmental Rural Solutions, the provincial forestry department and the South African National Biodiversity Institute, an academic research institute.

These organizations work together to build social capital – the resources associated with a network of relationships. The network is a convergence of Indigenous knowledge, expertise and data, with the goal of empowering all participants to take equal ownership of water governance.

Basin partnerships typically serve a smaller area and all the people living within it. Their goal is often to preserve a river system and its basin so that the water can be used to create local jobs and economic growth.

They do not have such expensive water infrastructure and rely on the natural resources of nature – water from natural springs, food from wild fruits or firewood used for cooking.

Are these regulations unique to South Africa?

Water user associations and watershed partnerships are not unique to South Africa. They also exist in England, Scotland, Tanzania, Nepal and Indonesia. In these countries, water user associations and watershed partnerships have led to water management by a variety of organisations and they face many of the same problems.

What problems can arise in water management?

Water user associations such as the Vaalharts Water User Association need more time to make decisions. Technical experts from finance, human resources, engineering and other fields need to be consulted, as well as subcommittees to give their opinion and even the Department of Water and Sanitation.

As a result, maintenance of infrastructure and agreement on fair water distribution between farmers, industry, cities and communities progress slowly or do not materialise at all.

In catchment partnerships such as the Umzimvubu Catchment Partnership, grassroots and local organisations seek to work together to reach consensus.

This makes decision-making faster, easier and more effective. However, they lack funding, mainly because they consist of organizations without a large funding base. Sometimes their member organizations take care of their own water needs first before considering a partnership.

What impact do these agreements have on water, energy and food security?

My research revealed that the Vaalharts Water Users Association focused exclusively on water security, but the main beneficiaries were commercial farmers who grew cash crops such as pecans, alfalfa, peanuts, wheat, citrus and grapes.

My research found that people in the Umzimvubu Catchment Partnership have greater overall water, energy and food security. For example, the households I studied in the Umzimvubu Catchment Partnership were able to supplement their water supply with safe drinking water from a source that the Catchment Partnership had restored and protected. The Catchment Partnership also tested the water quality and set up tanks to store the water, providing over 700 people with clean, free drinking water.

In addition, a limited amount of water was available for their livestock. This improved food security for households in the Umzimvubu catchment area. Free water meant that families had more money to buy electricity.

The catchment partnership has implemented projects to remove invasive trees that strain local water supplies, helping to restore natural grasslands where livestock graze, creating greater food security.

What changes do you propose and why?

The South African government wants to establish more high-level water governance structures such as water user associations. Based on my research comparing the Vaalharts Water Users Association and the Umzimvubu Catchment Partnership, this is the wrong approach.

Top-down structures that limit broad participation and increase bureaucracy and corruption may not be able to deliver the water, energy and food security that South Africa needs. One effective change would be to dismantle water user associations and replace them with watershed partnerships.

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