Overview 3
The Challenge Africa is urbanizing fast. Over the next 20 years, Africa’s urban population will double. At 3.9 percent per year, urban population growth rates in Africa have been and will continue to be the highest in the world. Currently about 320 million Africans live in urban areas (37 percent of the African population), more than twice as many as in 1990. By 2030, Africa’s urban population is forecast to rise to almost 50 percent of the population, or some 654 million people. Demand for water is growing. Population growth in cities is driving this demand, but economic growth will add to it. More industry requires more water, and prosperity raises expectations for the quality of water services. A projected increase in the size of the middle class might lead to a demand for better governance and better services including more water services (World Bank, 2012). And water use outside cities, for agriculture and power, will grow even faster, putting more pressure on dwindling water resources. When these pressures are combined, it is projected that over the next 25 years the demand for water in Africa will almost quadruple—a much faster rate than any other region in the world (2030 Water Resources Group, 2009). Water supply is shrinking, and water quality is deteriorating. As water demand grows, cities are forced to rely on water sources that are further from the city—and more expensive to tap. Land use changes upstream, including increasing informal irrigation and industry, have altered the seasonal pattern of runoff: there is more flooding in the wet season and less, but more turbid, water in the dry season. Groundwater might provide an alternate source of water, but poor sanitation threatens groundwater sources. Climate change will add uncertainty to this already precarious future for African water resources. Source protection, addressing water allocation issues, and improved wastewater management need to be part of any solution. Water catchment issues are being felt in cities that did not expect it. Mbale, Uganda, one of the case studies in this book, is located in a high precipitation area at the foot of Mount Elgon, where surface water availability has traditionally been plentiful. Yet the city had to ration water in February 2012 for the first time, as one of its river sources dried up, and turbidity increased in the other. People—moving up the mountain in response to population pressure—were watering their gardens from mountain streams, leaving less water for the city downstream. This kind of increased competition for water in a catchment is happening through-