African Vignette: Working for Water

Simple and effective

Acacia saligna, one of the water-depleting exotics of South Africa.

In running a country, it’s pretty rare to be able to combine into a single program goals that seem to have nothing in common.  Yet, in South Africa, some truly inspired individual has managed to address two desperate needs at the same time—water and unemployment. 

Rivers of South Africa, many of which are impacted by exotic, water-hungry plants. Short streams drain the edges of South Africa, while most of the interior is drained by the Orange River.

The first desperate need is water.  South Africa is a dry country, so dry that it has wastewater treatment facilities so advanced that, by the time a river reaches the sea, its water has been re-used five times.  One does not want to dwell on certain aspects of this technical achievement, but remarkable as it is, the supply of water still does not meet water needs.  A few years ago, someone pointed out that some of the largest users of water are not industries, municipalities or agriculture.  They are actually foreign invaders in South Africa --- exotic plants that grow along river banks, in stream beds and on flood plains, transpiring millions upon millions of gallons of water into the air every day.  A mature eucalyptus tree moves over 600 liters of water from the ground into the atmosphere every day, water that is subtracted from the stream flow.  Many stream banks and even stream beds are choked with black wattle, Sesbania, broad-leaved acacias and other woody stuff, large and small, all drinking thirstily from the water table.  In many places, the thickets are so dense that it is impossible for anything larger than a schnauzer to pass among the stems.  These thickets dry up streams, crowd out many native plants and make river valleys unsuitable for many uses.  In many a river valley, it is possible to drive for miles and see only dense thickets of exotic plants.

A selection of exotic plants that grow in riparian zones where they deplete the water table and stream flow. Left to right: black wattle, Acacia saligna, Sesbania punicea.

Now to the second desperate need.  A legacy of apartheid and the period of sanctions against South Africa have been economic decline and unemployment as high as 40% or more.  Such high levels of worklessness have potential destabilizing effects on governments.  Furthermore, with the end of apartheid, the government of the New South Africa made promises, promises that are going to be hard to keep under conditions of economic decline. 

Pondering these needs, somewhere, someone had the idea: why not reduce unemployment by hiring people to eradicate and control exotic plants along streams, thereby increasing the water supply?  Thus was born the “Work for Water” program which is currently in full swing, employing over 60,000 people. 

There is nothing high tech about Work for Water.  Armed with axes, machetes and chain-saws, crews enter a river valley and begin cutting down all exotic plants, from 100 foot tall eucalyptus to skinny Sesbanias.  All over South Africa their clearing frontiers can be seen--- a field of stumps in the foreground, a wall of dense exotics ahead, their remaining days on earth to be tallied on one hand.  The wood of some of the species is useful as firewood, and a few species are even beautiful.  So in another inspired moment, someone thought, wood carvers cut down our native trees all over the country in order to make carvings for the tourist trade, and tourists in Kruger National Park and other parks demand firewood for their evening braai (barbecue).  Why not ease the pressure on our native trees by offering the wood produced by the Work for Water program free of charge to carvers and braaiers?  Would we be so frugal and practical in the USA?  More likely we would import wood from some suffering third world country for the one user and provide bottled gas from Alaska for the other, subsidizing some major corporation with a tax incentive to do so. 

Left: a stream bed choked with exotic, woody shrubs. Right: Work for Water employees clearing exotic vegetation from a stream bed.

The program incorporates a feature of many third-world foreign aid programs.  Pay a man a dollar, and there is a good chance that little of it will reach his wife and family, having been dissipated through drink or gambling or who knows what.  But pay that same dollar to a woman, and the chances are very good that it will benefit her family.  The Work For Water law therefore requires that half the employees be women, addressing both the family support issues and the role of women in the New South Africa. 

Women are required by law to make up half the Work for Water employees.

        Perhaps the greatest testimonial to the success of Work for Water is this:  repeatedly, in many locations, a crew clears vegetation from a stream that hasn’t run for years or is only seasonal.  The next day, yes, the very next day, water flows freely in the stream.  Would any reasonable human need more evidence?  The exotics can clearly be seen for what they really are--- water bandits that intercept ground water before it can see the light of day in a stream. 

This marsh land was once completely choked with Sesbania punicea, but a combination of biological control and Work for Water restored it to its original condition. My late friend, Cliff Moran, was central to the biological control research in South Africa. He showed this scene to us proudly.