People-first public-private partnerships can help reach SDG 6

Great civilisations in Mesopotamia, Egypt, Rome and China were built on severely enforced water management rules. While humanity is far more merciful now, South Africans still need a significant shift to address the seriousness of water conservation, as well as increased water demand.

By Zaid Railoun

Several historians believe that failures of water management were once the cause of collapse of several early civilisations. In Mesopotamia, if your neighbour’s field was flooded because you did not maintain your canal, you had to replace his crop, or your household goods were sold. The Egyptians were less sympathetic; allowing banks to weaken or deteriorate was punishable by death.

These events should be a warning for South Africa and its lagging water management and infrastructure issues. Over a third of our water supply is lost due to ageing and leaking infrastructure before it can even be used.

The mismanagement of water infrastructure can result in economic water scarcity and affect the economic infrastructure of other sectors like mining, manufacturing, agriculture, education and health.

Getting priorities straight So instead of revising the water law, rather prioritise the spade of work through improvised public-private partnerships (PPPs), regular maintenance of water infrastructure, take advantage of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and design and implement innovative treatment technologies for effective remediation.

There are already good examples like direct sewage reuse and MLD (minimal liquid discharge) and ZLD (zero liquid discharge) from desalination activities in the AMD (acid mine drainage), which should be improved at the research and development level so that we as a country can benefit not only locally but internationally.

The law is not the problem – the people governing and managing water are the problem. Politicians tend to blame the unpredictable weather and use this as a distraction when talking about past failures. South Africans need a significant shift to address the seriousness of water conservation, as well as increased water demand. Government and the private sector need to develop effective policies and sustainable solutions under our current demanding conditions.

People-first PPPs are a necessity. By ensuring that out of all stakeholders, ‘people’ are on the top, the focus is on improving the quality of life of the communities, particularly those that are fighting poverty. This is done by creating local and sustainable jobs and, most importantly, access to water. People-first PPPs must expand in scale, speed and spread, with more people having access to better services at affordable prices.

We have a long way to go to meet the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) aimed at ensuring access to basic drinking water for all by 2030 and our ‘own’ 2025 problem – our time is running out; our time is now. Our hope is for the new National Water Resources Infrastructure Agency to be more transformable and not transactional, as we are accustomed to.