Deputy Chairperson, distinguished guests and hon members, I'm here on behalf of the select committee chairperson, hon Qikani. I wish her daughter a speedy recovery after her accident. In less than 10 days, our nation will host the global community as part of the 17th Conference of the Parties, commonly known as Cop 17. Central to the talks of Cop 17 will be discussions on how climate change and global warming adversely affect our natural resources such as water and the environment.
Allow me to express our profound appreciation that this important event takes place on the shores of our nation and at an opportune time when we are in the process of rallying all our people to join the fight against global warming and the degradation of our natural resources.
Cop 17 is made even more significant because by 1990, already the impact of water shortage was being felt across the globe. The World Bank wrote in respect of its water policy reform programme:
Water is essential for all dimensions of life. Over the past few decades, use of water has increased, and in many places water availability is falling to crisis levels. More than eighty countries, with forty per cent of the world's population, are already facing water shortages, while by year 2020 the world's population will double. The costs of water infrastructure have risen dramatically. The quality of water in rivers and underground has deteriorated, due to pollution by waste and contaminants from cities, industry and agriculture. Ecosystems are being destroyed, sometimes permanently. Over one billion people lack safe water, and three billion lack sanitation; eighty per cent of infectious diseases are waterborne, killing millions of children each year.
This view was also shared later in the same year by the chairman of the World Commission on Water for the 21st Century at the water forum in the Netherlands, when he said:
Water has become a highly precious resource. There are some places where a barrel of water costs more than a barrel of oil. More than one-half of the world's major rivers are being seriously depleted and polluted, degrading and poisoning the surrounding ecosystems, thus threatening the health and livelihood of people who depend upon them for irrigation, drinking and industrial water.
If by 1999 there was already this great concern about the decreasing volumes of water, then indeed, 12 years later water - which for many of our people is supposed to be a basic service - should be a scarce resource.
South Africa is one of the few countries in the world that enshrines the basic right to sufficient water in its Constitution, which states that everyone has the right to have access to sufficient food and water. However, much remains to be done to fulfil this right. As we speak now, most of our communities, especially our rural communities, are struggling to access this basic right.
After the end of apartheid, our democratic government inherited huge service backlogs with respect to access to water supply and sanitation. People and communities at large are still complaining about this problem and the challenge to access water is becoming huge. People complain about not having water at all, not having enough water, the scarcity of clean water or having no community water supply, etc, depending on where they live.
In the Eastern Cape province ...
... ngakumbi emaMpondweni aseMpuma kunye naekwaZulu-Natal, eMzinyathi, ieMkhanyakude nakwiesiThili sasesiSonke ... [... especially among the Mpondo tribes in the East and KwaZulu-Natal, Mzinyathi, Mkhanyakude and the Sisonke district ...]
... there are still areas where they access water from a river which is a kilometre away.
In some areas that have no rivers at all or have rivers but not sufficient water, it is a struggle to get water. There are instances in which, because there is no running water for them, people would share water with animals.
This means that access to safe, potable water continues to be one of the most pressing challenges for rural communities in our country. However, going through these areas and communities, one will find pockets of water, which maybe will need to be purified for consumption or managed for irrigation purposes.
We know that the democratic government, over the past years, has tried to correct this situation by developing a number of programmes, policies and feasibility studies which seek to address the management of this scarce and important resource.
In the Eastern Cape, for example, a case study on water conservation and a demand management project implemented by the Mvula Trust on behalf of the Department of Water Affairs in Ndlambe Local Municipality, from July 2008 to March 2010, revealed that the Ndlambe Local Municipality, as the MEC has alluded to, was facing a crisis in 2008. This crisis was as a result of huge water losses, wastage and inefficiency in its water supply network, causing considerable loss of revenue and water supply shortages in many communities.
The result of this was that all the water supply sources for Ndlambe were almost dry. About 15 million people were without a safe water supply. Therefore, the Department of Water Affairs appointed the Mvula Trust to assist Ndlambe to pilot a water conservation and water demand management project. The primary aim of the project was to minimise water losses, wastage and inefficiency through social, technical, economic, institutional and legislative interventions.
As you would know, we are just coming back from a long but very interesting trip of Taking Parliament to the People, to the Mzinyathi District in KwaZulu-Natal. With regard to everything that we heard from the people of that part of the country and all their needs, the President responded by outlining all programmes that were already being implemented and those that are still in the pipeline.
He made mention, especially in relation to water, of the fact that they are busy considering expanding the water supplies, that the number of boreholes will be increased and the water treatment plant will also be expanded soon. [Interjections.] Chairperson, they are disturbing me.
Also, we will establish the small dams projects to address the lack of bulk water supply and eradicate the water tank truck delivery system.