News / Local
Bulawayo is left with 20 months' water supply
23 Dec 2011 at 18:18hrs | Views
On Friday the Zimbabwe National Water Authority (Zinwa) said Bulawayo's water supplies are safe, as the city's five supply dams have recorded increases in water volumes since the onset of rains in November.
In an interview on Friday, Umzingwane catchment area operations manager Stanley Nazombe said safe water supplies were guaranteed despite the dams having received insignificant inflows.
The city's supply dams are Upper Ncema, Lower Ncema, Inyankuni, Umzingwane and Insiza.
According to the latest figures released by Zinwa, the dams have a combined capacity of 43,4 percent.
In February this year the dams once at 71 percent of the capacity.
The latest council report indicates that Bulawayo is left with 20 months' water supply from its dams.
"The Upper Ncema was 19 percent before the onset of the rains in November, but now it has 14 percent capacity," said Mr Nazombe.
He said Lower Ncema was now 77 percent full from 73 while Inyankuni had a two percent increase to 18 percent capacity.
Mr Nazombe said Umzingwane had 20 percent capacity while the largest supply dam, Insiza was 88 percent full up from 84.
"The inflows are not yet significant, but the supplies are guaranteed for some time," said Mr Nazombe.
He could not be drawn to disclose the actual duration of the supplies.
"The improvement of the dam capacity is very small but what I can tell you that we still have the water for some time," said Mr Nazombe.
Bulawayo needs to have at least one supply dam built after every 10 years to accommodate the needs of an ever-growing population and expanding industrial and agricultural activities.
The last dam to be constructed was Insiza in 1976.
The short term solution to Bulawayo's water problems, Mtshabezi-Umzingwane project, has not been completed several years since it was started.
Although the Minister of Water Resources Development and Management, Samuel Sipepa Nkomo, had said the project would be completed this year, Zinwa engineers on the site said a more realistic date would be March next year.
It is expected to ease water woes in the city for a while before a growing population outstrips its added supply.
In an interview on Friday, Umzingwane catchment area operations manager Stanley Nazombe said safe water supplies were guaranteed despite the dams having received insignificant inflows.
The city's supply dams are Upper Ncema, Lower Ncema, Inyankuni, Umzingwane and Insiza.
According to the latest figures released by Zinwa, the dams have a combined capacity of 43,4 percent.
In February this year the dams once at 71 percent of the capacity.
The latest council report indicates that Bulawayo is left with 20 months' water supply from its dams.
"The Upper Ncema was 19 percent before the onset of the rains in November, but now it has 14 percent capacity," said Mr Nazombe.
He said Lower Ncema was now 77 percent full from 73 while Inyankuni had a two percent increase to 18 percent capacity.
"The inflows are not yet significant, but the supplies are guaranteed for some time," said Mr Nazombe.
He could not be drawn to disclose the actual duration of the supplies.
"The improvement of the dam capacity is very small but what I can tell you that we still have the water for some time," said Mr Nazombe.
Bulawayo needs to have at least one supply dam built after every 10 years to accommodate the needs of an ever-growing population and expanding industrial and agricultural activities.
The last dam to be constructed was Insiza in 1976.
The short term solution to Bulawayo's water problems, Mtshabezi-Umzingwane project, has not been completed several years since it was started.
Although the Minister of Water Resources Development and Management, Samuel Sipepa Nkomo, had said the project would be completed this year, Zinwa engineers on the site said a more realistic date would be March next year.
It is expected to ease water woes in the city for a while before a growing population outstrips its added supply.
Source - TC
