Thesis (MSc. (Agricultural Economics)) -- University of Limpopo, 2011 / In-field rainwater harvesting technology is the technique that combines the advantages of water harvesting, no till, basin tillage and mulching on high drought risk clay soils. It reduces total runoff to zero, and also considerably reduce surface evaporation. The scarcity of agricultural water is increasing at a faster rate than for other sectors in Limpopo Province. Sufficient, clean drinking water is essential to life, but millions of people throughout the world including South Africa continue to have no access to this basic necessity. This study aimed at investigating the extent and nature of adoption of in-field rainwater harvesting technology by households in Lambani village of Limpopo Province. The main objectives of this study were to identify factors determining the in-field rainwater adoption technology for cropland productivity in Lambani village and to determine the extent to which in-field rainwater harvesting adoption influences cropland productivity in Lambani village. Simple random sampling technique was used to select 70 farmers in Lambani village of Limpopo Province. Data was collected using a structured questionnaire. Descriptive statistics, logistic regression model and linear regression model were used to analyse the data. Descriptive statistics was used to describe the characteristics of households and the nature of Lambani village, and logistic regression model was used to investigate factors that determine the adoption of infield rainwater harvesting technology, while linear regression model was used to determine the extent to which in-field rainwater harvesting influence the cropland productivity in Lambani village. The results from the logistic regression model indicate that 5 variables out of 10 variables are significant in explaining farmers’ adoption decision. Land size, access to financial service, access to information and contact with extension officer are some of the variables that have significantly positive effects on the adoption of infield rainwater harvesting technology, while hired labour has significantly negative correlation with adoption. Variables such as household size, level of education, age of the household, level of income and the main water source do not significantly influence adoption of in-field rainwater harvesting. This information will help prioritize

Thesis (MBA.) -- University of Limpopo, 2007 / The residents of Lebowakgomo in Lepelle-Nkumpi Municipality experience numerous inequalities in relation to water services provision. Some of the residents protest towards the inequalities through refusal to pay for the water services. The confrontational non paying residents field questions which the municipality can hardly answer. The problem of refusal to pay is of the magnitude that recently the municipality had to go house-to-house pleading with the inhabitants to pay if the municipality was to continue to provide water services. The specific objectives of this study were three-fold: (1) to determine water service quality using residents’ perceptions on water services in Lebowakgomo, (2) to determine residents’ expectations and perceptions on water services in Lebowakgomo, and (3) to determine the residents’ perceptions on water service quality and customer satisfaction in Lebowakgomo using age, gender, qualification and suburb. A questionnaire comprising five dimensions, namely, tangibles, reliability, assurance, empathy and responsiveness, was compiled to collect data from three suburbs of Lebowakgomo in Lepelle-Nkumpi Municipality. The original sample size was 120, with 9 becoming spoiled due to missing data. The independent variables comprised age, qualification, suburb and gender. Most of the data were analysed for kurtosis and skewness and with the exception of one variable, the rest of the data did not conform to parametric analysis criteria. The major findings of this study indicated overall negative perceptions of residents’ on four dimensions of empathy, reliability, responsiveness and assurance on water service quality which implied that the residents were dissatisfied with the service and called on management to use SERVQUAL as a valid model of assessment to identify areas requiring immediate attention for service improvement. On the other contra positive it was revealed that the municipality was doing well on the tangibles dimension. ix The study recommended use of SERVQUAL in measuring quality of other services within the constitutional competencies of the municipality and further research to investigate age contribution to service quality.

Are South Africa's water service delivery policies and strategies equitable, accessible, affordable, efficient, effective and sustainable for Msunduzi low-income households? The primary objective of this study was to elicit the community experience of South Africa's water service delivery policies and strategies and link these experiences to a broader analysis of policy and strategy to locate water service delivery contraventions, inconsistencies and inadequacies. The secondary objective was to initiate community-based platforms for engagement with water-related issues and build capacity within local community task teams to initiate lobbying and advocacy strategies to support community-suggested and research-outcome reforms thereby returning popular control to the locus of communities. The study was conducted in KwaZulu-Natal, within the Msunduzi municipal jurisdiction, under the uMgungundlovu district municipality (DC22) in the period from October 2002-April 2003. Households in five low-income urban areas were included in the study: Imbali (units 1 and 2), Sobantu, Haniville and Thembalihle. The study employed a community action research design using non-probability sampling. Surveys, conducted by community researchers, were complemented by broad community engagement approaches, informal interviews with external stakeholders and the initiation of platforms for information sharing and fundamental debate. The study revealed two significant findings. The first finding found that South Africa's water service delivery policies, strategies and implementation mechanisms were inconsistent with the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry's sector goals of equity, affordability, efficiency, effectiveness and sustainability. They contained serious scientific and social inadequacies, inequitably promoted economic considerations above social and environmental considerations; lacked regulation and monitoring systems to identify and address implementation contraventions; were not receptive to the socioeconomic situations of low-income households and should be fundamentally re-worked. Policies and strategies purported to ensure that the basic water service requirements of low-income households were met, essentially compounded socio-economic constraints and compromised human rights, justice and equity. The second finding was related to popular involvement and engagement. Community consultative processes for input into local and national policies and strategies were inadequate and often pseudoparticipatory; political platforms (local and national) for communities to engage and influence decision-makers were inadequate or lacking; and the community control, ownership and acceptance of the Msunduzi water service delivery institution and its mechanisms were low. Recommendations for the reform of policy, strategy and implementation of such reforms were advocated through the vehicle of reviews, evaluations and audits, to inform the necessary amendments, adjustments and intensification of local and national regulation and monitoring mechanisms. Lobbying and advocacy strategies, to support the implementation of reforms, were promoted through community-based approaches of popular engagement with water-related issues, information dissemination; community mobilisation and popular control of public processes. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2003.

The aim of this study is to focus on how the Vulindlela Community benefited from water supplied to them through DWAF and Umgeni Water funding with emphasis on the sustainability of the project. The study also aims to find out from Vulindlela Community whether the scheme met its objectives. The sample consists of 2 888 respondents from Vulindlela area. The measuring instruments used are the interviews and questionnaire constructed by the researcher. The results of this study indicate that all the objectives of the scheme were met and that the community especially women, unemployed men and local contractors all benefited from the project. The issue of sustainability of the scheme is the real problem. The community (Branch Officers, local plumbers, meter readers and committees) has been trained in handling water related issues but the community has not accepted the ownership of the scheme. If the ownership of the scheme is lacking, there will be problems throughout. The non-payment of water used by the community will continue to be a problem if the community itself does not take the ownership of running and maintaining it. The community needs to be empowered and be trained on the operation and maintenance (OM cost recoveries and the tariff structure. The results also indicate that the community understands the free water policy and that most of them are using less than 6 kilolitres per month. The willingness to pay from the community is low, to such an extent that most of the households are due for disconnections or restriction. This is supported by the fact that most of them are earning less than RI 000 - 00 per month and in some households the bread winner is an elderly person who is dependent on government grants. The 6 kilolitre free water is not sustainable under the conditions, which this community find themselves in. There are challenges facing the scheme and these are discussed under Chapter 5. Since some limitations of this study were found, the results must be interpreted with caution and one should be cautious in applying them. / Thesis (M.B.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2005.

The Table Mountain group aquifer system has the potential to be an important supply of water. Although the aquifer system is used to some extent, a number of aspects relating to the aquifer system are poorly understood and unquantified. This study aimed to take into consideration the importance of differenct ecosytems, which is essential in predicting the effects of groundwater abstruction. However, the ecological requirements of systems that depend on groundwater are poorly understood. This project identified &quot / type areas&quot / for further detailed research into the impacts of large-scale groundwater abstraction from the Table Mountain group aquifer system based on the nature and functioning of ecosystems across groundwater dependent ecosystem boundaries of a regional scale.

This Masters research took place in the Kat River Valley in the Eastern Cape, South Africa. The Kat River Valley is a semi-rural catchment that covers an area of approximately 1700km² and is characterized by a complicated history of dispossession and resettlement. Farming is the main activity that is practiced in the area. This includes the farming of citrus at a commercial scale, rangeland stock farming and small-scale vegetable farming. The economy of the catchment is enhanced mostly by commercial citrus farming, which consumes by far the largest amount of water in the river through irrigation. Water allocation is a burning issue among water users in the catchment and needs to be negotiated taking into consideration social, economic and environment impacts. The aim of this study is to describe, discuss and evaluate the Companion Modelling (ComMod) approach, which used a simulation model and a role-playing game related to the model in order to facilitate and develop negotiating skills as well as build capacity in decision-making amongst local stakeholders for water resource management in the Kat River Valley. The ComMod approach, developed by a group of Companion Modellers, is a community-based science approach that emerged in the 1990s. The ComMod approach is used in order to facilitate collective learning, negotiation and institutional innovation in dealing with resource management complexities faced by rural communities. Through ComMod, the model (KatAWARE) and its related role-playing game was developed by having the contact with local stakeholders. The information to feed the model and the role-playing game came from informal interviews, surveys, geographic information systems (GIS), workshops and focus groups. The use of workshops in the implementation of ComMod was a success. Results show that (1) new knowledge was acquired, which allowed stakeholders to have a broad understanding of a catchment system. (2) Awareness was created about complex systems and enabled stakeholders to see an individual action into to the broader system. (3) Strong interrelationships were fostered amongst different water users, which allowed stakeholders to share their view points. The ComMod process was however associated with a number of limitations, many of which resulted from the constraints that were imposed by the socio-economic background of the study area. Nevertheless, the outcome of the study shows that the ComMod process was useful in helping the Kat River Water Users Association (KRWUA) stakeholders develop negotiating skills regarding water allocation strategies for the development of the Catchment Management Plan.

Inadequate resources have always been suspected to be the main cause of persistent poverty and underdevelopment in many developing countries. Water is one such resource that is not readily available to many in South Africa. South Africa is a water-scarce country; access to adequate water provisions requires expensive infrastructure which can only be provided by the Government for most of the population. It is not certain whether there is a direct link between access to water and development or poverty alleviation. This study evaluated the impact that state water provision has on development especially in rural communities. The study concluded that there is indeed potential for community development where there is improved access to water. Findings further revealed the nature of several other variables that have significant roles in the relationship between access to government provided water and development. / Development Studies / M.A. (Development Studies)

Magister Scientiae (Integrated Water Resource Management) / The water resources management regime has shifted from one focusing almost exclusively on augmenting supply to one where ensuring access, equity and sustainability are an integral part of the process. A growing demand for water and the fact that the amount of fresh water is constant raises the impression of water scarcity will occur. Indications are that the notion of access to water for basic needs as well as access to productive water underpins perceptions of scarcity. This thesis interrogated perceptions of scarcity in a small rural community in order to understand the role water can play in developing sustainable livelihoods. / South Africa

Internationally, water resources are facing increasing pressure due to over-exploitation and pollution. Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) has been accepted internationally as a paradigm for integrative and sustainable management of water resources. However, in practice, the implementation and success of IWRM policies has been hampered by the lack of availability of integrative decision support tools, especially within the context of limited resources and observed data. This is true for the Crocodile River Catchment (CRC), located within the Mpumalanga Province of South Africa. The catchment has been experiencing a decline in water quality as a result of the point source input of a cocktail of pollutants, which are discharged from industrial and municipal wastewater treatment plants, as well as diffuse source runoff and return flows from the extensive areas of irrigated agriculture and mining sites. The decline in water quality has profound implications for a range of stakeholders across the catchment including increased treatment costs and reduced crop yields. The combination of deteriorating water quality and the lack of understanding of the relationships between water quantity and quality for determining compliance/non-compliance in the CRC have resulted in collaboration between stakeholders, willing to work in a participatory and transparent manner to create an Integrated Water Quality Management Plan (IWQMP). This project aimed to model water quality, (combined water quality and quantity), to facilitate the IWQMP aiding in the understanding of the relationship between water quantity and quality in the CRC. A relatively simple water quality model (WQSAM) was used that receives inputs from established water quantity systems models, and was designed to be a water quality decision support tool for South African catchments. The model was applied to the CRC, achieving acceptable simulations of total dissolved solids (used as a surrogate for salinity) and nutrients (including orthophosphates, nitrates +nitrites and ammonium) for historical conditions. Validation results revealed that there is little consistency within the catchment, attributed to the non-stationary nature of water quality at many of the sites in the CRC. The analyses of the results using a number of representations including, seasonal load distributions, load duration curves and load flow plots, confirmed that the WQSAM model was able to capture the variability of relationships between water quantity and quality, provided that simulated hydrology was sufficiently accurate. The outputs produced by WQSAM was seen as useful for the CRC, with the Inkomati-Usuthu Catchment Management Agency (IUCMA) planning to operationalise the model in 2015. The ability of WQSAM to simulate water quality in data scarce catchments, with constituents that are appropriate for the needs of water resource management within South Africa, is highly beneficial.

This is an in-depth case study of urban water services to poor households and their interactions with local state power in the community of Eastwood, Pietermaritzburg, in the province of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, for the period 2005-2007. It draws especially on the experiences of poor women, exploring the conceptions and implications of the movement of municipal services into the realm of welfare-based urban service concessions. It interrogates what value municipal services, framed in the language and form of welfare but within a commodification milieu and in the context of shifting citizen-state relations offer the state apparatus and how such free basic service offerings are experienced by poor households at the level of domestic, social and economic functioning. The study adopts a fluid mixed-methodological approach to optimise exploration and interpretation. It argues that the interface of state service delivery and citizens is fraught with contradictions: core to this is the nature of state ' help.' Free basic water encompassed in the social wage did not improve the lives of poor households; instead it eroded original water access. Free basic water stole women's time spent on domestic activities; compromised appropriate water requirements, exacerbated service affordability problems and negatively affected household functioning. Poor households experienced the government's policy of free basic services as containment and punishment for being poor. The Indigent Policy activated the state's surveillance, disciplinary and control apparatus. In the absence of effective national regulation over municipalities and with financial shortfalls, street-level bureaucrats manipulated social policies to further municipal cost recovery goals and subjugate poor households. Social control and cheap governance were in symmetry. Citizens, desperate for relief, approached the state. Poor households were pushed into downgraded service packages or mercilessly pursued by municipally outsourced private debt collectors and disconnection companies. Municipalities competing for investments brought about by favourable credit ratings abandoned the humanity of their citizens. Such re-prioritisation of values had profound implications for governance and public trust. Citizens were jettisoned to the outskirts of municipal governance, resulting in a distinct confusion and anger towards the local state - and with it, major uncertainties regarding future stability, redistribution and equity.