case study of drought in south africa

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• Published: 22 December 2022

Unprecedented droughts are expected to exacerbate urban inequalities in Southern Africa

• Maria Rusca   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-4513-3213 1 ,
• Elisa Savelli   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-8948-0316 2 , 3 ,
• Giuliano Di Baldassarre   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-8180-4996 2 , 3 ,
• Adriano Biza   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-6165-8939 4 , 5 &
• Gabriele Messori   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-2032-5211 2 , 3 , 6 , 7  

Nature Climate Change volume  13 ,  pages 98–105 ( 2023 ) Cite this article

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• Climate-change adaptation
• Socioeconomic scenarios
• Water resources

Climate change-related drought risks are intensifying in many urban areas, making stakes particularly high in contexts of severe vulnerability. Yet, how social power, differential agency and economic visions will shape societal responses to droughts remains poorly understood. Here, we build a social-environmental scenario of the possible impacts of an unprecedented drought in Maputo, which epitomizes a Southern African city with highly uneven development and differential vulnerability across urban areas. To build the scenario, we draw on theoretical insights from critical social sciences and take Cape Town (2015–2017) as a case-in-point of a locally unprecedented drought in Southern Africa. We show that future droughts in Southern Africa will probably polarize urban inequalities, generate localized public health crises and regress progress in water access. Climate policies must address these inequalities and develop equitable water distribution and conservation measures to ensure sustainable and inclusive adaptation to future droughts.

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Data availability

The qualitative data supporting the findings of this Analysis are available within the Analysis and its Supplementary Information (Extended case study: Maputo and Extended case study: Cape Town). Some qualitative data are not publicly available due to ethical restrictions (that is, they contain information that could compromise the anonymity of research participants). These data are available from the corresponding author ([email protected]) on reasonable request. Anonymized data will be made available within a month from the request. Data on the filling levels of the water reservoirs of the two cities are available at the City of Cape Town Data portal ( https://cip.csag.uct.ac.za/monitoring/bigsix.html ), the Direcção Nacional de Gestão de Recursos Hídricos (National Directorate of Water Resources, Mozambique, https://www.dngrh.gov.mz/index.php/publicacoes/boletins-de-bacias-hidrograficas ) and the Biblioteca Digital de Teses e Dissertações (Digital Dissertation Repositiry, https://repositorio.bc.ufg.br/tede/handle/tede/10365 ). The Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI) data can be retrieved from SPEIbase ( https://spei.csic.es/ ).

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M.R., E.S. and G.D.B. were supported by the European Union H2020 research and innovation programme, ERC Grant No. 771678 (HydroSocialExtremes); G.M. was supported by European Union H2020 research and innovation programme ERC grant no. 948309 (CENÆ); A.B. was supported by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) grant agreement W07.69.109. M.R.’s fieldwork in Maputo was supported by Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 656738 (INHAbIT Cities) and A.B.’s by NWO 07.69.109.

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Elisa Savelli, Giuliano Di Baldassarre & Gabriele Messori

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M.R. and G.M. conceived and designed the study. M.R., E.S. and A.B. undertook fieldwork in Maputo and Cape Town; M.R., E.S. and G.M. wrote the paper; all authors analysed and interpreted data and G.M., E.S. and M.R. developed the figures. All authors contributed to the revision.

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Extended data figures

Extended data fig. 1.

Twelve-month SPEI index for the cities of Cape Town (blue line) and Maputo (red line). The thick lines show the 13-month running mean of filling levels (%) of the reservoirs supplying Cape Town 61 and Maputo 142 . The labels on the x-axis indicate the center point of each year.

Extended Data Fig. 2

Summary of the phenomena, locations and authors of the case studies mapped in Extended Data Fig. 3 . See refs. 143 , 144 , 145 , 146 , 147 , 148 , 149 , 150 .

Extended Data Fig. 3

Locations of the case studies examined for the Theoretical Synthesis (Pillar 1).

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Rationale for extended case studies, Extended Case Study: Maputo and Extended Case Study: Cape Town.

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Rusca, M., Savelli, E., Di Baldassarre, G. et al. Unprecedented droughts are expected to exacerbate urban inequalities in Southern Africa. Nat. Clim. Chang. 13 , 98–105 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-022-01546-8

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Drought, water management, and social equity: analyzing cape town, south africa's water crisis.

• Department of Environmental and Ocean Sciences, University of San Diego, San Diego, CA, United States

Climate change impacts on hydrologic systems, coupled with increasing water demand and a growing global population, has led to depleted water resources in semi-arid regions around the world. This increase in water shortages has significant implications for environmental justice and equity concerns. One such region impacted by both water scarcity and deep-seated inequality is the Western Cape of South Africa, whose drought crisis reached peak recognition when the City of Cape Town released its notice of “Day Zero” in 2018, the day the city would turn off the taps to residents. This study examines the changes in physical factors prior to and during the 2015–2018 drought in Cape Town and evaluates how policy decisions made in response to this event interacted with existing social injustices. Analysis of the physical data finds only a slight direct relationship between rainfall and dam levels ( r 2 = 0.3), suggesting a more complex narrative for the decrease in water supply, including increased water use and management decisions. Of the many policies implemented to avoid Day Zero, some were found to be more effective and can be utilized long-term. The study also finds that the Cape Town water crisis has unveiled and heightened existing inequalities through placing a disproportionate financial burden on low-income communities. As droughts become more common, Cape Town provides a crucial case study for understanding the social, political, and environmental implications of drought management in the future.

Introduction

Climate change impacts on hydrologic systems, coupled with an increasing water demand from a growing population, have led to conflict over water resources in semi-arid regions around the world. Although water is critical to human health and survival as well as economic growth and production, over a billion people in developing countries lack adequate access to water ( Ziervogel et al., 2010 ). Global climate change will undoubtedly be a major stressor on freshwater ecosystems, especially in arid and semi-arid regions in the latter half of the twenty-first century ( du Plessis, 2019 ).

One such region is the Western Cape of South Africa, notably Cape Town, whose water scarcity recently reached a level that significantly threatened the freshwater supply of its citizens. Low levels of rainfall led to the worst drought in the region since 1904 ( Otto et al., 2018 ). Annual rainfall in the Western Cape had been steadily decreasing in the last few decades, with 2017 having the lowest annual rainfall since 1933 ( Morabito, 2018 ). Past research suggests that human-caused climate change made this drought five to six times more likely to occur ( Tucker, 2020 ). Along with low rainfall, Cape Town's water resources are also under increasing stress due to a consistently increasing population. The city's population grew from 2.4 million people in 1996 to 4 million in 2017, a 67% increase. During the same time, the dam storage capacity only increased by about 15%, and rainfall remained highly variable ( Nhamo and Agyepong, 2019 ). This forebodes further future water supply scarcity and the viability of future water access, a crisis seen around the world as more people move to urban centers, placing pressure on the water sources supplying these cities ( Parker et al., 2018 ).

During the 2014–2017 drought, the overall dam levels supplying Cape Town dropped from 92.5 to 23% ( Nhamo and Agyepong, 2019 ). Cape Town's water crisis reached peak recognition when the city released its notice of “Day Zero” in January of 2018. Originally predicted to be in April 2018, Day Zero was the point when the dam levels that supply the city's water would hit 13.5%, at which time citywide water rationing would be enforced ( Millington and Scheba, 2020 ). At that point, taps would shut off to residents and water distributed through communal standpipes, limited to 25 l per person per day, as per the World Health Organization's minimum short-term emergency survival recommendations. In part due to management decisions and several subsequent high rainfall events in the winter of 2018, “Day Zero” never became a reality, though the city strongly felt the effects of water shortage during these years. Although much of the press focused on Cape Town as a major metropolitan area, this drought affected cities across the region.

Extreme events like Day Zero could become much more common by the end of the century ( Tucker, 2020 ). Therefore, this multi-year drought in the Western Cape can serve as an example for other water scarce cities and regions to explore their changing drought risks. As climate change hazards worsen, it is crucial to understand the physical changes up to this point, and to evaluate the strategies and adaptations the city undertook in response. This includes assessing the changes in environmental conditions, but also the political, economic, and social implications of a reduced and variable water supply. Prioritizing water resources management is necessary, as decreasing water availability in these regions could easily lead to social unrest and conflict. South Africa has undertaken significant progress in their water policy and infrastructure, which provides a unique case study of changing management decisions. Understanding the crisis in Cape Town requires recognizing the role of the governance system, as it provides the foundation for the management and accessibility of water.

Further, water resource policy and management have significant implications for environmental equity and justice. Water access and allocation are deeply social processes; therefore, to explain the Cape Town crisis, it is crucial to recognize how they intersect with social justice issues. The World Economic and Social Survey found that poor and marginalized groups would likely experience the worst impacts of future water shortages ( Savelli et al., 2021 ). The history of water access in South Africa mirrors its political history, divided along racial and class lines. Because South Africa has such a deep history of inequity, the policy outcomes from this event may also provide a test case for the justice concerns that accompany water scarcity in other regions.

Attempts at addressing and improving water resources management is not new. In fact, since the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 1992 (Rio), the concept of Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM), defined by the Global Water Partnership as a process promoting the coordinated development and management of water resources to maximize economic and social welfare with considerations of equity and sustainability of vital ecosystems, and what it means in practice has been the topic of extensive discussion ( Hassing et al., 2009 ). Numerous studies present case studies of integrated approaches in water management in drought prone areas, such as Australia ( Mitchell, 2006 ) and Mexico ( Wilder and Romero Lankao, 2006 ). While others examine policy linkages to equity in access in Namibia and Botswana ( Thomas and Twyman, 2005 ) and incorporating equity into policy in watersheds in Texas and Arizona ( Toledo, 2021 ). Further, Goff (2020) evaluated indigenous and non-indigenous approaches to water management in Australia for improved equity. However, Allouche (2020) notes that a divide between integration approaches and equity in water resource management remains and calls for interdisciplinary analysis interlinking equity, sustainability, and integration. Similarly, Keeler et al. (2020) developed a general toolkit for new approaches in order to advance water equity, seen as still lacking within sustainability science. Thus, the policies put forth in water-stressed regions around the world still need to be evaluated and assessed in the context of place, culture, and people so that lessons learned can inform small (or large) adjustments to achieve the goal of IWRM.

The aim of this study is two-fold. One goal is to determine the changes in the water bodies, rainfall, water usage, and population in the Western Cape over the last decade to better understand the water shortage. These findings may inform potential future impacts in other similarly populated cities and climates. The second goal is to evaluate the water policy actions taken in response to water scarcity in Cape Town through a socio-hydrological lens to determine the viability and justice of these adaptations. This study does not provide a systemic and all-encompassing analysis of the issue of water supply or governance as a whole, but rather presents a descriptive case study intended to continue the discourse on equity in water management that can be used in future analysis and discussion of freshwater supplies affected by climate change.

Specifically, the project aims to answer the following questions:

• How did physical factors (rainfall, population, dam storage, water usage) change within the last decade at the major supply dams leading up to the 2018 Day Zero drought event in Cape Town?

• What policies, adaptations, and management decisions did the government take to avoid Day Zero? What aspects of these policies remain today that could be adapted and/or sustained long term?

• How do the present policies address equitable access to water resources, and how can future adaptations ensure water access is environmentally just?

Materials and methods

In order to determine how physical conditions have changed in the past decade, we compiled data from various sources on rainfall, dam levels, water usage, and population growth over the specified timeframes in the Western Cape region ( Table 1 ). After retrieving daily dam level data from the “Big Six” dams from 2012 to 2021, we selected the South African Weather Service's rainfall gauge stations that were closest to each dam ( Table 2 ; Figure 1 ) and collected daily rainfall data 2010 to 2021 from those stations. To examine the relationship between these two variables, we calculated a regression analysis of rainfall and dam storage using monthly dam level averages and monthly rainfall totals (to account for the large variability in daily data), considering an approximated three month lag time that was identified as a best fit after exploring multiple timeframes.

Table 1 . Data sources (URLs provided in Appendix A ).

Table 2 . The Big Six dams and their corresponding rainfall gauge station.

Figure 1 . Big Six dams and rainfall gauge stations in comparison to secondary catchment areas in the Western Cape.

Using ArcGIS 10.9 ( ESRI, 2021 ), these various dam locations and rainfall stations were spatially analyzed in comparison to secondary and quaternary catchment areas, as well as water management areas, to identify spatial differences in physical factors as they relate to water management ( Figure 1 ). Further, we examined the rainfall-dam level relationship between each of the dams.

Monthly water usage data for 2008–2019, aggregated between all six dams, and urban and agricultural use were graphed together to visualize the trends in water consumption over the past decade. Next, population data for the Western Cape and the City of Cape Town helped to quantify how population dynamics played into water consumption during the drought years. Finally, in order to determine connections to climate change, we reviewed the literature, including data that support the linkages between drought, water scarcity, and global climate trends.

For the policy and adaptation portion of the study, research first included an extensive literature review of published academic articles and government reports concerning the history of water policy in South Africa and similar semi-arid regions. This involved reading policy documents from South African law, including the post-apartheid water acts and the policy measures taken in response to the 2015–2018 drought. This also included collecting data from publications analyzing the environmental implications of these laws and other water laws in similar semi-arid regions. After compiling qualitative data on the management techniques implemented in 2015–2018 leading up to “Day Zero,” we categorized the techniques as either temporary emergency measures or long-term policy changes. Next, we determined which of these policies remain today, and analyzed the long-term water infrastructure plans for Cape Town. Lastly, we reviewed the literature analyzing these policies that identified which techniques were most successful and/or helpful in avoiding “Day Zero.” Assessing the effectiveness of each policy consisted of reviewing analysis from past studies that examined each measure in detail, as well as reviewing the longevity of each action taken. It is crucial to consider the socioeconomic, institutional, and technological context of the policies taken, and while a number of these studies took into account some of these factors, we evaluated each measure through a holistic lens, following the framework of Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) and researching the history of each of these contexts in regards to each policy. This study is unique in that while several studies, cited in the introduction, evaluated policies similarly, those cases focused on specific projects or were not addressing a specific, intense drought event.

Evaluating Cape Town's management and policy actions provided an important opportunity to address equity issues in climate change adaptation, and to analyze whether the “Day Zero” responses to water scarcity could be implemented or adapted for long term use given these equity concerns. We reviewed articles, research, and testimony to determine how “Day Zero” policies affected different social groups and analyzed the policy measures through a social justice lens. From the findings, we summarized policies implemented and considered them through an environmental justice and equity perspective using the myriad of solutions offered by other studies.

This study begins with a background on the impacts of climate change on semi-arid regions, with detail on the Western Cape climate and water infrastructure system in order to establish the broader significance of the study, followed by an analysis of the possible factors of the water shortage based on the physical data. Next, the analysis of Day Zero policies identifies, first, their ability to curb overall consumption and, second, their long-term viability. A brief history of South African water policy as background on the current state of water infrastructure leads into a social analysis of past and current water policy in Cape Town. Using the results and analyses, some possible solutions for future water management are suggested to promote a more just and sustainable system. The study ends with conclusions on the Cape Town situation as well as implications for the broader region and other semi-arid areas.

Water stress in semi-arid regions

Water scarcity is an urgent issue for countless communities around the world, especially in arid and semi-arid regions. In 2014, estimates showed one in four large cities were water stressed due to geographical or financial limitations ( Brühl et al., 2020 ). Climate change will undoubtedly further exacerbate issues of water supply and availability, as droughts continue to shrink water supplies and urban populations further increase water demand ( Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), 2019 ). The land area of semi-arid regions is expanding with climate change, which will increase the populations that are prone to water-related crises ( Huang et al., 2016 ). With global temperature rise, projected droughts in these regions become extreme due to enhanced evaporation and lower amounts of precipitation ( Huang et al., 2016 ).

Semi-arid regions are sensitive to changes made by human activities. Concurrently, these regions often support large human populations, who rely on rain-fed agriculture to survive; therefore, slight changes in precipitation patterns could significantly affect the livelihoods of those communities ( Liu and Xia, 2004 ). Furthermore, a significant driver of water stress will come from population growth and development ( Eales, 2011b ). The UN estimates that cities will be home to an additional 2.5 billion people by 2050, 90% of which will be concentrated in Asia and Africa ( Brühl et al., 2020 ). Given this increase, the impact of climate change on water resources in these regions will be especially severe, affecting a significant portion of the global population.

The Western Cape climate

South Africa is no exception to the changes brought on by climate change. Past studies found that the country has seen a warming trend of 0.16°C per decade since 1951 ( South African Weather Service, 2021 ). The annual average temperature in South Africa for 2020 was around 0.5°C higher than the 1981–2010 average. Looking long-term, the estimated national trend for temperature increase is around 1.6°C, higher than the average global trend ( South African Weather Service, 2021 ). In fact, predictions suggest that Southern Africa will face climate change and urbanization at a faster rate than most other places ( Enqvist and Ziervogel, 2019 ).

South Africa, broadly considered as a semi-arid region, sits under the high-pressure belt in the mid latitudes of the Southern Hemisphere, which is generally unfavorable for the formation of rain. The country's topography results in higher rainfall in the southeast, broadly decreasing in a westerly and northerly direction. The country's precipitation patterns experience a large amount of temporal variability, with the dry western areas such as Western Cape experiencing the most variation. The country as a whole is largely a summer rainfall region; however, the west coast, including Cape Town, receives more winter rainfall than other areas ( van Rooyen et al., 2011 ). Large variations in rainfall result in even larger variations in river flow, that therefore require storage to provide for residents year-round. Overall, South Africa has characteristically low levels of rainfall, high levels of evaporation, a low rainfall to runoff ratio, and both a spatial and temporal variation in water availability ( Moseki et al., 2010 ). The country's average annual rainfall of 490 mm is much lower than the global annual average of 814 mm, while the average rate of potential evaporation is more than three times its rainfall ( Edmond, 2019 ). Although South Africa is considered a water-scarce country, at the macro-level in 2011 there was sufficient water available for socio-economic development, but it is not distributed equitably across the nation ( Moseki et al., 2010 ).

In this study, the area of focus is the Western Cape, which includes the major metropolitan city of Cape Town ( Figure 1 ). The Western Cape's main catchment areas are the mountains to the East/Northeast of Cape Town, where rainfall is highest. Most of the rain in that region comes from winter cold fronts in the Atlantic ( City of Cape Town, 2018 ). Fourteen dams, controlled and managed by the Western Cape Water Supply System (WCWSS), source the Western Cape. Six of these dams provide a majority of the water (referred to as the “Big Six” in publications and media). These six dams, which will be the focus of this study, include the Theewaterskloof Dam, the Berg River Dam, the Wemmershoek Dam, the Upper and Lower Steenbras Dams, and the Voelvlei Dam ( Figure 1 ). The Theewaterskloof Dam is by far the largest dam, with a larger capacity than the other 13 dams in the system combined ( Figure 2 ). The remaining eight dams not listed are much smaller than these six, and only contribute 0.4% to total capacity ( City of Cape Town, 2018 ). Cape Town sources about 95% of their water from the WCWSS, accounting for ~ 64% of the total WCWSS drinking water. The uses for the other WCWSS sourced water include agriculture (29%) and other municipal purposes (7%) ( City of Cape Town, 2018 ).

Figure 2 . Total capacities (light blue) and 2017 levels (dark blue) of the Big Six dams that supply Cape Town, South Africa.

The WCWSS system helps the region optimize their water resources by allowing for the transfer of water between dams and catchment systems. For example, if one dam is running low, another dam's supply can fill it, and excess water from river systems can be stored in one of the dams and then transferred back to the river in the dry season. Cape Town has twelve water treatment plants, which collectively provide a capacity of 1,600 million liters (Ml) per day. The city has 25 bulk reservoirs and over 100 smaller distribution reservoirs, which help provide treated water based on demand peaks and lags ( City of Cape Town, 2018 ). The number of households with direct access to piped water is high in Cape Town (88%) compared to other parts of South Africa, with nearly all households having indirect water access through a public tap ( Brühl et al., 2020 ).

This system provides service to over 4.1 million people and 650,000 properties in Cape Town, numbers that are rapidly increasing each year with population growth and migration into the urban center. In fact, there are 8,500 new customers added to this service each year ( City of Cape Town, 2018 ). Water consumption from “formal properties” in the City is metered, and consumers are billed monthly for their water use. Average domestic consumption in 2018 was 660 L per day for households, and 460 L per day for flats and complexes ( City of Cape Town, 2018 ). Household consumption in the city is greater than in many other metropolitan areas in South Africa.

Historical overview of South African water policy

Although the multiyear drought and climate change have certainly influenced the water crisis in the past decade, they do not tell the entire story. The political and social dimensions of water rights in South Africa influenced both the response to the drought and how it affected individuals in distinct ways. As noted by Enqvist and Ziervogel (2019) , a “water crisis” is often at its roots a “governance crisis,” where the institutions and infrastructure in place fail to adapt to changing conditions. Disasters such as droughts often affect people in different ways depending on their class, gender, and race, and the situation in South Africa was no exception ( Grasham et al., 2019 ). It is not possible to analyze the drought without understanding the planning and construction of the infrastructure, and knowing who made these decisions ( Mihalopoulos, 2021 ). Therefore, wholly understanding the water crisis in Cape Town requires a reflection on the history of water policy in order to provide important context in what led the city to this breaking point.

South Africa has a long history of water access inequalities as the country struggles with its legacy of racial segregation and inequities. The water sector in South Africa has gone through many progressive changes to attempt to remedy the largely socially unjust, environmentally destructive, and economically inefficient management practices dating back before the apartheid regime ( van Koppen et al., 2011 ). The beginning of these harmful practices traces back to colonialism and imperialism that began in the 17th century. Racial conflict over water access began with the settlement of Cape Town ( Enqvist and Ziervogel, 2019 ). During the period of colonization, Europeans attempted to use the agricultural rules of colonizing countries in Europe, which have very different environments, in the dry climates in Southern Africa ( Dugard, 2010 ). Colonists exploited water and resource laws, as they had access and power when it came to controlling land, and therefore wealth ( Dugard, 2010 ). The centuries after early colonization brought about mass resource appropriation through divide-and-rule alliances and warfare ( van Koppen et al., 2011 ).

Broadly, colonialism led to the dispossession of most South Africans from their land and resources and introduced a long legacy of environmental racism in the country. This seizure of African resources provided a large amount of cheap labor through labor laws that ensured an exploitable Black labor force ( van Koppen et al., 2011 ). For much of South Africa's history, racial politics determined the management of resources ( Meissner et al., 2016 ). For example, colonists claimed that they were “predestined to possess the most fertile and temperate regions” because of the fact that they were not accustomed to the African climate, and that “the native people should be capable of living under more harsh conditions” ( Darmofal, 2012 ). Europeans asserted that they were more deserving of these prosperous and fertile lands, which from the beginning established a sense of dominion, superiority, and racism that has influenced how South Africans interact with land and the environment today ( Darmofal, 2012 ). Religious beliefs during colonialism, notably interpretations of Christianity, also played a large role in the way colonizers viewed their relationship to the land. One dominant Christian view during the colonial period was that of dominion over non-human nature, which led to many using resources simply for their own gain ( Schuman et al., 2018 ).

During this colonial era, water laws often relied on water permit systems, in which required users to apply for permits, generating significant revenue for the governing colonies and putting water rights in the hands of wealthy colonists ( van Koppen and Schreiner, 2018 ). The control of water and land by the colonial rulers displaced Black South Africans to unfertile areas that played into the growing racialized wealth inequalities that are still prevalent today. During apartheid, differential water rights and access were maintained divisions along racial lines. The apartheid government lacked a department to control and regulate universal water access; therefore, local governments ran their own infrastructures ( Nnadozie, 2011 ). Given their lower socioeconomic status, poorer black communities had inefficient and underfunded government structures to provide clean water ( Nnadozie, 2011 ). Water and sanitation services, primarily provided to whites, neglected informal settlements of Black South Africans ( Enqvist and Ziervogel, 2019 ). In 1994, when Apartheid ended, an estimated 30% of South Africans did not have access to adequate water services and approximately 50% lacked access to adequate sanitation ( Nnadozie, 2011 ).

After the apartheid era, the new neoliberal government attempted to make water access a priority as they created laws that aimed to provide water availability for all South Africans. For example, the 1994 Water Supply and Sanitation White Paper called for government subsidies for the cost of construction of basic water services ( RSA, 1994 ). Furthermore, the 1998 National Water Act is recognized as one of the most wide-ranging and comprehensive water laws that has been passed worldwide ( RSA, 1998 ). When these national water laws were passed in the late 1990s, they established and guaranteed water as a basic human right, which led to the formation of the free base water (FBW) program in 2001 ( van Koppen et al., 2003 ). A baseline standard, developed by the Reconstruction and Development Program–known as the RDP standard, determined that 6,000 L of water per household of eight people per month would be sufficient–which comes out to 25 L per person per day ( Calfucoy et al., 2009 ). They also established a maximum distance of 200 m from a source to a dwelling, and a minimum flow rate considered to be meeting the basic water standard ( Department of Water Affairs Forestry, 1994 ). Under these laws, the national Department of Water and Sanitation acted as the main regulating body, the Water Boards at catchment levels would provide bulk water, and individual municipalities would deliver water and sanitation to end users ( Enqvist and Ziervogel, 2019 ).

These national laws are highly acclaimed worldwide for providing an alternative method of managing water resources, promoting equity, and sustainability as core values in policy ( Pollard and du Toit, 2019 ). Central to each of these acts is the concept of integrated water resource management (IWRM), defined by the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry as “a philosophy, a process and a management strategy to achieve sustainable use of resources by all stakeholders at catchment, regional, national and international levels, while maintaining the characteristics and integrity of water resources at the catchment scale within agreed limits” ( Pollard and du Toit, 2019 ). The National Water Act therefore focused on decentralization of water management and an increased emphasis on stakeholder engagement and consultation.

The concept of IWRM engrained in the post-apartheid water laws brought the blueprints for a system of Catchment Management Agencies (CMAs), which would be nineteen lower-level institutions in charge of managing and allocating water to individual users ( Mackay, 2003 ). The intent of the CMAs was to ensure representation of local stakeholders in water policy decisions and management, and to guarantee that management power is not concentrated at the national level ( Meissner et al., 2016 ). The plan aligned the CMAs with the nineteen established water management areas (WMAs), which divide the country along catchments that do not necessarily match government administrative boundaries. However, from the founding of the system in 2001 until 2012, only two CMAs have been created. Therefore, the number of planned agencies were reduced from nineteen to nine, and the boundaries of the Water Management Areas were adjusted to align with the new CMAs ( Meissner et al., 2016 ). At present, only two of the nine CMAs are operational ( Figure 3 ): the Inkomati-Usuthu and the Breede-Gouritz areas. The other seven CMAs are in various stages of development ( Khorommbi, 2019 ). Cape Town falls under the Berg-Olifants CMA, which was not operational during the recent drought.

Figure 3 . Water management areas in South Africa, with which each Catchment Management Area (CMA) would align.

Despite the progressive water laws adopted post-apartheid, there continued to be issues with water availability and access for low-income communities. Many of the poorest households in South Africa did not have access to formal water services; therefore, they could not benefit from FBW until services were extended to them ( Mackay, 2003 ). Although the intention of the FBW policy was to provide water to low-income households, in practice it became difficult to target poor households alone. Furthermore, in many municipalities the cost of providing FBW is greater than the resources allocated to fund it ( Eales, 2011a ). A successful rollout of free basic water requires significant local subsidies, or administrative support that exceeds that of the local municipality ( Eales, 2011a ). Most metropolitan areas have at least some capacity to manage water demands; however, many poorer or smaller towns/municipalities have varying degrees of challenges due to non-existent or dysfunctional infrastructure, low funds, and limited engineering capacity ( Moseki et al., 2010 ). Post-apartheid, there was an inherent disconnect between national laws and local regulations, as uneven effort went into ensuring that the progressive laws and policies were enforced and complied with by local governments ( Dugard, 2010 ). Therefore, in 2019, an estimated 37% of freshwater was lost via the existing urban infrastructure across the country ( Edmond, 2019 ).

While the 1994 Water Supply and Sanitation White Paper called for subsidies of the cost of construction of services, subsidies were not available for the “operating, maintenance, or replacement costs” of these services ( Dugard, 2010 ). This meant that when low-income communities that lacked the funds for operating and maintenance had infrastructure problems, service breakdowns and social unrest ensued ( Eales, 2011a ). The success of water legislation rests on the capacity to implement the resultant systems; this capacity is, in turn, limited by material and human resources, especially in technical fields such as water resource protection ( Pienaar et al., 2010 ). The participation of citizens in the planning and overseeing of service delivery is essential but is also quite challenging in communities that have been historically excluded from local government systems in South Africa ( Eales, 2011a ).

Due to these issues, in 2006 just over 40% of households in the poorest 20% of the population had access to piped water in 2006 ( Eales, 2011a ). Because infrastructure in low-income communities was often not well-maintained or managed, water meters in these areas often over allocated water usage and added debt to thousands of Black and colored neighborhoods ( Enqvist and Ziervogel, 2019 ). When these debts were not paid, authorities cut off the water supply to these consumers, which left some primarily Black communities without running water in 90% of the households ( Enqvist and Ziervogel, 2019 ). The introduction of water management devices to households in 2007 helped with this issue, as it allowed for providing FBW while cutting off supply in case of leaks or excessive use ( City of Cape Town, 2007 ). However, these devices did not forgive already accumulated water debt in these communities, and not all areas had access to these technologies.

A complex dynamic arose in the handling of water access in which a commitment to universal water availability coincided with a push toward the commercialization of water ( Millington and Scheba, 2020 ). This issue of water governance dynamics in the post-apartheid era was deemed ‘impossible terrain' by Gillian Hart, which describes a “complex, contradictory, and volatile relationship between scales of government, the need to address deep existing inequalities, and a simultaneous impetus to maintain fiscal solvency” ( Millington and Scheba, 2020 ). This issue arises in South Africa where the local government placed in charge of water service delivery lacked the funds to do so adequately. Because of this, many local governments felt pushed toward the commercialization of these services in order to generate revenue. As water commercialization by municipal services increased throughout the country, poor communities experienced more and more water supply disconnections as they could not afford maintenance and repair ( Dugard, 2010 ). Across South Africa, and especially in the urban cities where privatization occurred, water is less of a public service and more of a product allocated to maximize profits ( Dugard, 2010 ). Despite its proposed intent to increase water access, water commercialization brought with it a “white urban-industrial water economy,” serving wealthier whites who could afford privatized water ( van Koppen et al., 2011 ). These issues left white urban areas with water services comparable to those in well-developed countries, and poor black townships with poor management and a lack of infrastructure ( van Koppen et al., 2011 ).

Therefore, although FBW was made into law to provide water for low-income residents, the commercialization and lack of capacity of local governments led to the opposite, where low-income townships had less access to FBW ( Millington and Scheba, 2020 ). Additionally, FBW often was insufficient for those low-income residents who managed to receive it. For example, the government in Cape Town has a per household per month water allowance, which failed to account for larger or multi-generational households, number of dependents, illnesses, or other factors that may disproportionately discriminate against poor urban areas ( Dugard, 2010 ). With many households having large numbers of people, and many families struggling with HIV/AIDS, the FBW allowance was insufficient to meet basic needs and caused residents to forgo basic hygiene and health ( Dugard, 2010 ). Water supply either cuts off automatically after the allocated amount runs out unless residents pay for additional water, an option many cannot afford. This process therefore tends to punish low-income groups, as these households typically have higher than average number of individual residents. Similarly, those communities whose water did not automatically terminate often did not have individually metered water supplies, therefore each household was billed a monthly flat rate amount that was too high for the majority of households ( Dugard, 2010 ).

Ultimately, the post-apartheid laws leading up to Day Zero, although well intentioned, arose in a system with historical socio-economic and racial inequalities. In 2017, South Africa had the highest Gini coefficient, a measure of wealth disparity, of the 154 countries surveyed by the World Bank, reflecting the deep-seated inequalities in the country ( Sieff, 2018 ). Ten percent of the South African population owns over 90 percent of the wealth and this wealth inequality is broadly divided along racial lines, with white people more concentrated in wealthy areas ( Sieff, 2018 ). The legacies of colonialism and apartheid have left a deep-rooted racial inequality that still affects the distribution of wealth today. This racial wealth gap has meant that Black people in the country have unequal access to water compared to White people, even decades after the passing of post-apartheid laws.

Given this inequality, a significant portion of Cape Town's poor citizens' access water via a communal tap. Therefore, a sort of “Day Zero” remains a constant reality for many residents. Formal households consume 66% of the City's water, whereas informal settlements, where 14% of households in Cape Town are living, use only 4% ( Ziervogel, 2019 ). The average daily water consumption for units in informal settlements is 40 L per day, and these units can often host up to 15 residents ( Savelli et al., 2021 ). There is a wide difference between the water consumption of high-income and low-income residents in Cape Town. For example, some neighborhoods consume between 774 and 8,560 L per person per day, lower middle-class neighborhoods average between 90 and 350 L per person per day, and informal settlements average around 10 L per person per day ( Savelli et al., 2021 ). Therefore, while water access has increased in the past few decades, water use still divides along socio-economic and racial lines.

Physical changes

Analysis of physical factors indicate no single driver of the water shortage event, but rather that a combination of factors drove the “Day Zero” event in Cape Town. Each of the physical factors examined played a role in the water shortage event in 2018, including rainfall, water use, and population. For example, average rainfall in the Big Six dams over the 2015–2017 drought was 45.11 mm/month, a 34.5% decrease from the pre-draft monthly average (2008–2014) ( Figure 4 ). There were no observed differences in rainfall within different catchment areas. The regression analysis of monthly rainfall and dam levels at each of the Big Six dams over an 11 year period yielded a slight positive relationship ( R 2 values ranged between 0.26 and 0.43) ( Table 3 ). This indicates that at the Big Six dams, 26–43% of the dam level can be explained by rainfall in the three months prior ( Figure 5 ). This leaves 57–74% based on other factors. These factors may consist of both physical changes, including temperature, runoff, and evaporation, and human influences, such as dam management and changes in water usage. When the Big Six dams were aggregated to account for local geographic variability, there was also a slight positive relationship between monthly rainfall and dam levels ( R 2 = 0.30).

Figure 4 . “Big Six” monthly rainfall from 2008 to 2019.

Table 3 . Daily rainfall/dam level regression ( R 2 ) values at Big Six dams from 2010 to 2021 (using a 3-month lag time).

Figure 5 . Big Six-monthly rainfall and dam levels from 2008 to 2019 ( R 2 = 0.30 with a 3-month lag-time).

Spatially, there were only slight differences observed between dam levels in different catchments or in different water management areas. The Steenbras Upper dam's water levels were highest during the drought. The Theewaterskloof and Voelvlei dams' levels were the lowest, the two dams with the highest capacities. The relationship between rainfall and dam levels were also lowest at these high-capacity dams, and highest at the Steenbras Lower dam, which has a relatively small capacity ( Table 3 ), indicating other influences on the dam storage at high-capacity locations. Steenbras Upper Dam also had a low correlation between rainfall and dam levels, although this dam has one of the lowest capacities.

In evaluating other factors influencing water levels, agricultural water use peaked (2016) one year after urban water use (2015), both during years of drought ( Figure 6 ). Urban and agricultural water use has been decreasing since 2016, with a slight increase in urban water use in 2019 compared to the year prior ( Figure 7 ). The population in both the Western Cape and in Cape Town has been steadily increasing for the past several decades, with Cape Town's population averaging an annual increase of 2.6% over the drought period (2015–2017) ( Figure 8 ).

Figure 6 . “Big Six” urban and agricultural water use 2008–2019.

Figure 7 . “Big Six” dams monthly peak water use from 2008 to 2019.

Figure 8 . Cape Town population from 1950 to 2020 ( www.macrotrends.net ). According to census data, the percent increase in Cape Town's population mirrors that of the Western Cape between 1996–2016 ( Statistics South Africa, 2016 ).

Policy implications

The City of Cape Town utilized a variety of different tactics in their attempt to curb water use during the drought period, especially as “Day Zero” drew nearer ( Table 4 ). The city developed the Critical Water Shortages Disaster Plan in October 2017, which included three phases of water rationing, disaster restrictions, and disaster implementation. These tactics can be categorized into either temporary limitations and restrictions in response to the threat of emergency, which have been largely discontinued since the avoidance of “Day Zero,” or long-term policy improvements that can be sustainably adapted and implemented going forward. Short-term emergency measures included water restrictions on urban use by way of water management devices, water pressure regulations, and eventually quotas on water use after the announcement of “Day Zero”. Water management devices set a daily limit of water for individuals' properties, and steadily reduced water pressure in municipal pipes ( Parks et al., 2019 ). Short-term measures also included a number of communication campaigns, including mobile apps that provided water saving tools and incentives, a water map to show heavy-users, and the scare-tactic education campaign revolving around “Day Zero.” The city also collaborated with the University of Cape Town to develop a map that acknowledged the households saving the most water as a tool for positive reinforcement ( Martinus and Naur, 2020 ). Additionally, hard quotas on water use were set for the nearby agricultural sector in 2018, which allowed more water transfer to the city, with some water brought in from other regions in South Africa to supplement the supply. Finally, water tariffs increased temporarily, and the free basic water policy ended for all households not considered indigent (as defined by the government) ( Millington and Scheba, 2020 ). These measures were undertaken and defined by the City of Cape Town's Department of Water and Sanitation, which took the primary role in Cape Town's water management during the crisis.

Table 4 . City of Cape Town measures put into place in 2017/2018 to avoid “Day Zero.”

In contrast, there were certain measures used in response to the water shortage that are still in use and/or can be adapted for long-term use. These include better water management and infrastructure, including the implementation of smart water meters in schools, increased data monitoring, and a weekly water dashboard released by the city to keep residents informed on the status of dams and water usage. Long-term measures also include an increased investment in diverse new water sources, including desalination and groundwater. Although the new tariff system continued past the drought period, as of November of 2020 tariffs are back to pre-drought levels. Additionally, there are new permanent water saving regulations in the city. These include restrictions on outdoor water use, such as only allowing watering during certain hours and regulating the positioning of sprinkler systems, maximum flow rates for showerheads and washbasins, recycling and re-use for car washes, mandates for swimming pool covers, and regulations on water use for construction sites ( City of Cape Town, 2020b ). These measures were carried out by the city government and have been added to the City of Cape Town water bylaw. The extent to which these regulations were or are still enforced by the city government is not entirely clear.

In May of 2019, in response to the “Day Zero” event and the ongoing regional drought, the city approved the Cape Town Water Strategy. This strategy outlines the city's path toward a “sustainable water future,” which considers impacts due to climate change. The plan makes five main commitments to their citizens: Safe access to water and sanitation, wise water use, sufficient reliable water from diverse sources, shared benefits from regional water resources, and becoming an overall water-sensitive city. The vision for the city is to “(optimize) and integrate the management of water resources to improve resilience, competitiveness and livability for the prosperity of its people” by 2040 ( City of Cape Town, 2019 ). The city claims that through their investments in new water sources, which include wastewater, desalination, and groundwater, there will only be a slight increase in cost, still making water costs per month much less than the cost of a water bottle. As of 2019, water resources were 96% sourced from surface water and 4% from groundwater. In the water strategy, they plan to grow desalination to 11% of the resource supply, increase groundwater to 7%, and source 7% through recapture for industrial, commercial and landscaping uses, and aquifer recharge. Today, the city continues to monitor their water levels daily, and remains conscious of where water use occurs.

Given that there was weak positive correlation in rainfall and dam levels at each of the Big Six dams, it appears that more factors contributed to the water shortage in Cape Town beyond simply a decrease in rainfall. Many factors could affect this link, including evaporation, runoff, increased water usage, and dam management (e.g., dam water release policies). For example, a past study found that in South Africa the large variations in rainfall result in greater variations of river flow due to the typical lack of soil moisture in need of replenishment. This means that much of the rainfall does not likely reach each dam due to this soil replenishment ( van Koppen et al., 2011 ).

Moreover, two different governing entities manage the dams in the WCWSS. The National DWS manages the three largest dams in the system—Theewaterskloof, Berg River, and Voelvei ( City of Cape Town, 2020a ). The City of Cape Town is responsible for the other three: the Steenbras Upper and Lower, and Wemmershoek. Steenbras Upper typically maintains as full a level as possible, as this dam provides water to a large area and runs the Steenbras hydroelectric power station. This strict management explains why this dam storage had such a low correlation with rainfall. The Steenbras Upper Dam also received augmentation during the drought years from another region in South Africa, which justifies why its storage levels were so high while the rest of the “Big Six” dropped to such low levels during the drought. The overall differences in management at each of these dams likely contributed to the differences in R 2 values.

The City of Cape Town (2020a) reported that dam levels drop from water use by agriculture, the city, and other municipalities, as well as evaporation. The high-capacity dams, such as Theewaterskloof, cover a large surface area, therefore greater evaporation at these dams can alter the relationship between rainfall and dam storage. The increase in both agricultural and urban water use at the beginning of the drought in the Big Six dams would indicate that consumption habits also contributed to the drop in water levels. Further, the steady increase in Cape Town and Western Cape population suggest that dam storage will likely be under increased stress going forward as more urban users tap into these resources, regardless of rainfall patterns. Overall, these physical analyses indicate that while a decrease in rainfall was a driver of the water shortage, it was not the sole cause of the crisis. Media throughout the drought event focused heavily on the drought (i.e., lack of rainfall) as the instigator of the shortage; however, this was just one aspect of a complex dynamic. When evaluating water management going forward, it is crucial to not only consider rainfall, but to monitor the other factors as well. This highlights the importance of water policy in adapting to climate change, as successful management can have a significant impact on dam levels (water supply) despite the precipitation in a given year.

Overall, the management decisions employed to avoid “Day Zero” were successful in curbing consumption and allowing the city to prevent further temporary measures, such as turning off residential water taps and bringing in water from sources outside the Western Cape. “Day Zero” never came to be in part due to these consumption reductions. Dam levels have been rising since 2019 and have stabilized above 95% in the past few years. While there were a wide range of policy techniques used to accomplish this, some measures were more impactful than others. Several studies indicate that residents responded most actively to the communication campaigns put out by the city, including the publication of the City's Disaster Plan, the threat of “Day Zero,” and the publication of neighborhood water use ( Matikinca et al., 2020 ; Visser et al., 2021 ). Among the methods of water restrictions, tariffs, and communication campaigns, the Day Zero campaign ranked highest in raising awareness of the issue, and water restrictions ranked highest in terms of encouraging water savings at the household level ( Matikinca et al., 2020 ).

Results of these studies indicate that water tariffs did not have a significant impact on water consumption, but rather that non-pricing mechanisms were more effective in encouraging consumption change. This has important implications for water governance techniques in Cape Town and other drought-prone regions going forward, as prioritizing social pressures and restrictions on heavy users seem to be effective in managing consumption in the future, while pricing mechanisms are less so. However, while behavioral interventions were very effective in reducing water use, this may be diminished by inadequate water infrastructure to implement these solutions, as this requires significant funding ( Visser et al., 2021 ). The long-term impact of these policies on consumption patterns will be seen in the next few years, as these restrictions have since been lifted, and communication campaigns have slowed since Day Zero was avoided.

Social impacts

Day zero policies and equity.

When the government introduced the “Day Zero” plans to handle the water crisis, the management steps seemed to solve the issue and appeared to be beneficial to the common good of the city. For example, the city ramped up water tariffs to place limits on water use of heavy users. Additionally, the city prohibited use of municipal water for lawns, swimming pools, and other non-essential uses. The government also put a water-pressure system into effect that reduced water flow, which cut down on about 10% of municipal water consumption ( Alexander, 2019 ). In this system, the city adjusts the water flow through the reticulation network when an area is using above the daily limit of water and restores the pressure when water usage reduces back to below the daily limit.

However, after analyzing the policies in respect to the existing inequalities in the city, these measures made it even more difficult for certain neighborhoods and income levels to access drinkable water. The policies failed to resolve the contradictory water governance dynamics, but rather displaced the effects onto future generations and harmed already marginalized residents. The techniques used throughout the drought, although they succeeded in reducing consumption levels overall, primarily focused on reducing consumption of wealthier residents, which historically provided the tariff funds that served to cross-subsidize the usage of the poorer communities ( Millington and Scheba, 2020 ). In fact, the city lost an estimated R6.1 billion in revenue due to reduced water consumption during the drought ( Brühl et al., 2020 ). The fees and water management devices placed on high-volume users were controversial, as 10 ML saved per day would cost the city 40% of its revenues ( Enqvist and Ziervogel, 2019 ). This highlights a contradiction in the water governance system, in the government having a commitment to equitable water distribution while also trying to ensure full cost recovery. This drought exposed one of the flaws of the current tariff system, as sufficient revenues are reliant on the overuse of water by wealthy residents. With the tariff increases during the drought, since low-volume users had less room to reduce their consumption, they had to bear a higher-than-normal water bill while high-income households paid the same due to their consumption decreases ( Enqvist and Ziervogel, 2019 ). Further, during a drought revenue is lost due to the necessary reduction in usage. Thus, development of a tariff/rate structure that better balances fixed and variable costs with marginal pricing is needed, along with investigating other potential sources of revenue so that the basic functions of the system are consistently funded. Consumption habits changed more due to communication campaigns and restrictions than tariff increases ( Matikinca et al., 2020 ; Visser et al., 2021 ), proving this policy change was both ineffective and unequitable.

Furthermore, when the city withdrew the universal FBW provision, those who did not quite qualify as being indigent or were unable to register therefore had to pay new high tariffs for all water and had water management devices installed. The process for registering as an indigent household is difficult, especially for poor residents. Many households fail to register as indigent due to lack of awareness, socioeconomic restrictions, fear, political motivations, or inconvenience ( Enqvist and Ziervogel, 2019 ). Therefore, this decision caused many low-income families to have to pay higher tariffs than they were accustomed to pre-drought. The lowest tariff water price bracket increased by 600% in February of 2018 ( Brühl et al., 2020 ). While high-income households could not retain their high standards of water consumption, these low-income families could not meet their basic water needs. A 2018 report also found that the majority (64%) of water management devices were installed in poor communities rather than high-consumption homes, which was both an inefficient use of resources and placed further water stress on these low-income residents ( Mlaba, 2020 ).

Moreover, while many wealthy residents could afford to find individual solutions to the crisis for their residence, low-income residents lacked the funds to be proactive and independent in their solutions. As many wealthy residents could afford buying large quantities of bottled water, digging wells, or buying desalination machines, poor residents were left with few options but to cut back on food to buy bottled water at inflated prices ( Morabito, 2018 ). In fact, most of the reductions of water uses occurred because of the pursuit of alternative water sources ( World Wildlife Fund, 2020 ). Over 60% of high-income households installed rainwater tanks on their properties during the drought ( Brühl et al., 2020 ). This made it clear that when the public utility fails to provide the desired amount of water, wealthy private citizens will secure their own water in ways that may not be equitable or sustainable. Therefore, although water consumption by high-income residents was lower through the public utility, the drought brought further privatization and commercialization of water, which exacerbated the inequality of water access.

Overall, Cape Town's policies provide an example of the potential harms of policies created at the national level that do not establish mechanisms to accommodate and seek equity for the demographics of the local area ( Nhamo and Agyepong, 2019 ). Despite media and government perception, water insecurity in low-income areas, both in townships and informal dwellings, was more intense than that for the middle- and upper-class areas. Once restrictions were introduced, although water consumption changes were slightly less drastic for lower income citizens, these changes lasted longer for township dwellers, while consumption habits reverted back to previous levels more quickly for the city's wealthier residents ( Savelli et al., 2021 ). Therefore, the drought cannot be generalized as one citywide societal impact or response. Rather, the crisis revealed contradictions in water governance that has deepened existing socio-economic inequality, which may continue given the likelihood of new policies due to climate change in the near future.

Some solutions

Several limitations affected this study. With respect to the physical data, these include the lack of availability of specific spatial data to analyze the differences between management at specific dams, and the lack of data on both the history (pre-1990s) of the climate and water management in South Africa. Due to the increased drought risk with climate change and the growing urban population in Cape Town, there is a need for continued monitoring of the Day Zero policies long term, especially their impacts on vulnerable groups, to determine the sustainability of these management decisions into the future.

Additionally, although some research exists using first-hand interviews with residents to evaluate perceptions ( Matikinca et al., 2020 ; Savelli et al., 2021 ), there is a need for follow up interviews several years after the drought to better understand the effectiveness of communication campaigns, how the culture has shifted, and what residents remember from the event. We could not conduct interviews following the drought due to COVID-19 travel restrictions, limiting a full evaluation of the success and failure of the policies, intertwined with the socio-economic, institutional, and technological contexts. This ultimately affects the overall completeness of the results. In an attempt to address this, we added examples of some successful practices in other drought prone regions such as California and Australia [ Cahill and Lund, 2013 ; California Natural Resources Agency (CNRA), 2021 ], including how reduction success varies depending on the type of rate structure and implementation ( Zerrenner and Rambarran, 2017 ) and on the combination of education and awareness campaigns, water restrictions, and other development programs in Australia and Spain ( Bryx and Bromberg, 2009 ). We hope that additional studies conduct interviews related to the short-term and long-term policies before peoples' memories begin to fade. It is clear that a combination of practices and policies are needed to be prepared for future droughts, and with this study we hope to further the discourse into these different policies so that improvements can be made.

Given the equity and sustainability issues with current water management in South Africa and the contradictions exposed through the Day Zero policy measures in Cape Town, it is clear that there needs to be a change in water governance in order to ensure justice in management practices, particularly as rainfall becomes less reliable and extreme droughts more common due to climate change. A review of existing measures and management efforts reveals several recommendations that seem well-suited to handling the crisis in Cape Town. In their analysis of South Africa's water management, Schreiner and Hassan (2011) identify three key factors that good water governance can be paired down to: “predictable, open and enlightened policy making, a professional bureaucracy acting in the public interest, and a strong civil society active in public affairs.” They also identified a key challenge in water services and resource management: the translation of policy into practice, no matter how well-intentioned the legislation is at the macro-level. The 2017–2018 crisis in Cape Town emphasized these two conclusions. Using this framework, we suggest several solutions to aid Cape Town, and other drought-prone regions, in building a water governance system that considers these factors in order to withstand the impacts of climate change and increased demand going forward.

Integrated water resource management

Many of the suggestions below relate back to the idea of Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM), as recognized in the 1998 National Water Act. One result of the post-apartheid water legislation was the formation of the previously mentioned CMAs, though most of these agencies were never established. The Cape Town drought response was worsened by many factors, including a lack of trust and collaboration between political entities and different stakeholders, issues in data monitoring and access, competition between different sectors, and an absence of expert knowledge and expertise ( Munnick, 2020 ). These issues could be addressed at least in part by fully functional CMAs. Therefore, the completion of these agencies should be a priority. These agencies will be better equipped to respond to the needs of local residents and stakeholders, especially those impacted most by water shortage. The South Australian Environmental trend and condition report card 2018 for Water Management highlights an example of a high (86 on as of 0–100) degree of integrated water resources management and improved water allocation planning, with the implementations of water allocation plans (WAPs) in the State increasing 79% over 10 years [ Department of Environment and Water (DEW), 2018 ]. This more integrated approach in Cape Town would include a diversification of water sources to accommodate fluctuations in rainfall, since the city is highly reliant on rain-fed dams, such as more sustainable urban drainage and capture, wastewater treatment, water reuse, water efficiency efforts, and other solutions that are mindful of adverse environmental impacts ( Oral et al., 2020 ).

Connection between levels of government

Similarly, greater collaboration between national, provincial, and municipal levels of government, already needed prior to the drought, may have reduced or prevented many of the water management issues that occurred ( Pienaar et al., 2010 ). During the drought, the national government was slow to react, especially regarding agricultural restrictions ( Wallace, 2021 ). In 2015, the Western Cape provincial government requested funds from the national government for investment in water infrastructure and that they declare the Western Cape as a disaster area ( Brühl et al., 2020 ), both were turned down. These funds, finally approved in late 2017, were not available to the provincial government at the time of greatest need. Also, as groundwater use is regulated by the national government's DWS, the city lacked the power to prevent the drilling of private boreholes ( Brühl et al., 2020 ). The national government will continue to play a crucial role in water management given its responsibility to ensure equitable allocation of water at the broader level. Therefore, unless the city, province, and state work together to ensure that water is distributed efficiently and equitably, emergency responses will continue to be delayed and ineffective.

Increased collaboration with the public, especially vulnerable groups, to build back trust

A lack of trust between residents and government authorities was a significant issue for Cape Town during the crisis, especially given the long history of discrimination faced by black and colored residents and the failure to redress these injustices ( Ziervogel, 2019 ). This tense relationship is one of the most needed and crucial areas for improvement for the city ( Edmond, 2019 ). One key focus should be on building a relationship with Cape Town citizens and recognize them as legitimate stakeholders in water management. This could lead to increased citizen participation in water governance, which would help reduce resistance to water laws ( House, 1999 ; Priscoli, 2004 ; Rodina, 2019 ). An inclusive water management will consider the experiences and needs of the vulnerable communities within its governance.

Reformed financial model

A major equity concern with the Day Zero policies was the imbalance of financial burden, through the increase in tariffs and removal of the FBW from non-indigent households that ultimately disproportionately affected low-income communities. Because low-income household usage did not contribute as significantly to the water crisis, maintaining FBW for a portion of the population based on income level could help avoid new water costs that many poorer families faced. Further, there is a need for new funding sources that do not rely on the overconsumption of wealthy residents. Enqvist and Ziervogel (2019) suggest a “rainless day fund” to help buffer tariff funds during a crisis. In some cases, a fund provides subsidies in disadvantaged communities in California ( U. S. Water Alliance., 2017 ), with varying degrees of success ( Elmer, 2021 ). More established long-term funding would be required to supplement tariff revenues, especially as future droughts place a strain on water resources. Needed are both an investment in water infrastructure and a reduction of water consumption by wealthy households, and the financial system should make both of these more feasible.

Continued focus on cultural shift through communication targeted at wealthy residents

With climate change likely making water scarcity more common, there ultimately needs to be a shift in the relationship that wealthy urban residents have with water. Although the communication campaigns were successful in curbing water consumption, targeted campaigns like that of “Day Zero” do not always have long-term impacts, as people tend to forget about hazards after a few years ( Matikinca et al., 2020 ). Cape Town cannot sustain its residential water consumption, which is 35% above the global average ( Heggie, 2020 ). While increased water rates can result in conservation in residential water consumption in similarly drought prone regions such as California, as seen in the 2021–2016 drought [ California Natural Resources Agency (CNRA), 2021 ], and Australia ( Cahill and Lund, 2013 ), reduction success varies for different types of rate structures ( Zerrenner and Rambarran, 2017 ). Because tariff increases did not have a significant impact on household water consumption in this Cape Town crisis and can carry equity issues, other solutions must be found or improved. Several studies suggest that education and awareness campaigns, in combination with water restrictions, and other development programs, reduced water consumption significantly in Melbourne, Australia, and in Zaragoza, Spain, during nine- and five- year droughts, respectively ( Bryx and Bromberg, 2009 ). While numerous urban water use efficiency and conservation actions exist, further improvement in consumption changes can come through education and a long-term mindset shift, a difficult task. However, without this paradigm shift, even with the investment into new water sources and other efficiency solutions, the country will eventually run out of drinkable water, as wealthy citizens will resume water overuse, while low-income people in the city will continue to lack affordable access to water and sanitation services.

There are many lessons learned from Cape Town's Day Zero event that can inform water management and decision-making of the South African government and other governments in drought-prone regions. Overall, while the response made to the water crisis in Cape Town avoided the worst-case scenario in the short-term, policies and management decisions exposed the framework of injustice that exists in water management in South Africa, and further heightened many of the existing inequalities. Future preparation for and response to water shortages need to acknowledge the implications of policy on various social groups, as well as the systemic issues that have plagued low-income communities of color over the past few decades. Governance processes designed to promote trust and collaboration between citizens and government will only be achieved through recognizing and working through the challenges that all social groups face.

Additional studies are needed to dive deeper into the impact of these policies on different social groups, different locations, and different uses. For example, water restrictions likely had a disproportionate impact on women, as domestic workers had to wash laundry by hand and travel farther for water ( Wallace, 2021 ). And as populations are segregated spatially in different areas in and around the city, study on how the policies affected different areas could also inform future water management. Furthermore, full analysis of land use changes and agricultural water usage is needed. Approximately 30,000 agricultural jobs were lost during the drought, and production for major crops was down 20.4% from the 2017 to 2018 harvesting season ( Parks et al., 2019 ). Research into the social impacts on these different groups, would shed light on how the drought event continues to affect vulnerable communities and necessary industry (agriculture/farming), and how these communities and farms are adapting. It is recommended that any future work on this event, and other similar events, approaches the subject through a framework of Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM). Thus, an evaluation of policy measures should include the deeply intertwined social, economic, institutional, and technological contexts.

Perhaps most importantly, there is a need to further study the impacts of water shortage in South Africa as a whole, as the Western Cape is South Africa's most equitable province in terms of water access among social groups ( Enqvist and Ziervogel, 2019 ). Although water infrastructure is relatively well-established in Cape Town, there is a need for increased attention given to low-income areas in other parts of the country that often have issues with water access and sanitation. In 2018, over five million South Africans lacked access to reliable drinking water and 14.1 million people lack access to safe sanitation, and less than half of households nationwide have piped water in their homes ( Department of Water Sanitation, 2019 ).

Although the Western Cape and Cape Town were the main area of focus for “Day Zero,” other parts of South Africa were hit hard by this drought and overall low water supply in the past decade. For example, in 2019, rural communities in the KwaZulu-Natal province were forced to go weeks without municipal water, while the drought kept rainfall low and 35% of municipal supply was being lost to theft and illegal connections ( Heggie, 2020 ). The Eastern Cape similarly saw thousands of residents without water in 2019, with five municipalities declaring drought disasters. The Gauteng province, where Johannesburg and Pretoria are located, is dealing with a decreasing water supply and a rapidly increasing population, as the region's daily consumption is rising rapidly—a daily increase of 264 million gallons—while their next large dam will not be completed until 2026 ( Heggie, 2020 ). The Northern Cape is facing serious drought implications for its agricultural sector, with hot weather and low rainfall leading to desertification, crop failures, and the wipeout of two thirds of the province's game. At least $40 million is needed in the province to alleviate the impacts of the drought and to secure the more than 60,000 jobs that are dependent on agriculture ( Heggie, 2020 ). Finally, the Eastern Cape is currently dealing with record-level water shortages due to multi-year drought and poor management ( Rakhetsi, 2021 ). Water scarcity is a concern all over the country and therefore must be a policy priority at all levels. Addressing the future water problem for Cape Town should be a component of the wider region, formulated as a national-scale strategy.

Lessons learned from Cape Town's water crisis have significant implications for other semi-arid regions around the globe as they learn how to manage their own regional “Day Zeros.” Cape Town may have been the first major metropolitan city to almost run out of water, but undoubtedly, it will not be the last. As local and national governments plan for future water management, they can learn from the Cape Town crisis about the importance of equitable water management, clear and consistent communication with all stakeholders, and proactive adaptation to climate change. Sustainable water policy must consider all people, and disadvantaged communities cannot be left behind. Water access is a worldwide issue, and all regions must ensure that policy actions promote both long-term sustainability and social equity, and do not prioritize water access for the wealthy at the expense of the disadvantaged.

Data availability statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/supplementary material, further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.

Author contributions

CC conceived and designed the analysis, collected the data, performed the analysis, and wrote the paper. SW conceived and designed the analysis, contributed data and analysis tools, and edited the paper. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.

Research was supported by a University of San Diego Office of Undergraduate Research travel grant to present at the 2021 Fall Association of Pacific Coast Geographers meeting where CC was awarded the Best Undergraduate Student Paper at a Regional Conference, and funding to present at 2022 American Association of Geographers Annual conference in NYC.

Acknowledgments

The authors acknowledge the University of San Diego Lost River Otters research group for fruitful discussions and input on this and related topics, especially during the pandemic. We are especially grateful to Dr. Andrew Tirrell for reviewing the manuscript prior to submission and to the reviewers for suggestions that improved the manuscript.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher's note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors, and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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Appendix A. Data links .

Keywords: drought, water policy, equity, Day Zero, Cape Town

Citation: Calverley CM and Walther SC (2022) Drought, water management, and social equity: Analyzing Cape Town, South Africa's water crisis. Front. Water 4:910149. doi: 10.3389/frwa.2022.910149

Received: 31 March 2022; Accepted: 08 August 2022; Published: 07 September 2022.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2022 Calverley and Walther. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Suzanne C. Walther, swalther@sandiego.edu

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Perception of agricultural drought resilience in South Africa: A case of smallholder livestock farmers

Affiliation.

• 1 Department of Agricultural Economics, Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa.
• PMID: 34230844
• PMCID: PMC8252168
• DOI: 10.4102/jamba.v13i1.984

Worldwide drought has significance and continues to pose long-lasting effects on the agricultural sector, including South Africa. The recurring drought is a major challenge to smallholder livestock farmers in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa. This study assesses the perception of smallholder livestock farmers towards agricultural drought resilience. The study utilised a perception index score using primary data collected from 207 smallholder livestock farmers following a structured questionnaire survey and multistage sampling procedures. The study found that the average perception index of the role of social networks and government to enhance agricultural drought resilience was negative, which implied that their role in enhancing resilience towards agricultural drought was insufficient. However, the perception of smallholder livestock farmers on the role of social networks was lower than the role of government. This study recommends coordination and cooperation amongst all role players to reinforce strategies to enhance smallholder livestock farmers' resilience. This includes coordinator amongst the local, provincial government, African Farmers' Association of South Africa, extension officers, private sectors, monitoring agencies in terms of reliable early warning information and communication amongst decision-makers. Collaboration amongst government departments at the national and provincial levels should be strengthening to enhance farmer's resilience. The collaboration includes the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries at the national level, Provincial Departments of Agriculture, National and Provincial Disaster Management Centres, South African Weather Service and Department of Water Affairs. Smallholder livestock farmers' awareness of the significance of social networking and government participation should be promoted.

Keywords: agricultural drought; government; resilience; smallholder livestock farmers; social networks.

© 2021. The Authors.

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Extreme drought in southern Africa leaves millions hungry

FILE - James Tshuma, a farmer in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, stands in the middle of his dried up crop field amid a drought, in Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. Zimbabwe declared a state of disaster Wednesday, April 3, 2024, over a devastating drought that’s sweeping across much of southern Africa, with the country’s president saying it needs $2 billion for humanitarian assistance. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi, File)

USAID and the United Nations’ World Food Programme aim to help some of the 2.7 million people in rural Zimbabwe threatened with hunger because of the drought that has enveloped large parts of southern Africa since late last year. (March 31) (AP Video/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi and Kenneth Jali)

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Women share peas during a food aid distribution in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

A woman holds an empty bucket while waiting to receive food aid in a queue in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

People wait in a queue to receive food aid in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe,Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

A woman carries a bag of maize meal received at a United Nations World Food Programme distribution center in Neno district, southern Malawi, Sunday, March 24, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Kenneth Jali)

FILE - A young boy with a donkey cart arrives to receive food aid in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. Zimbabwe declared a state of disaster Wednesday, April 3, 2024, over a devastating drought that’s sweeping across much of southern Africa, with the country’s president saying it needs $2 billion for humanitarian assistance. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi, File)

Women share cooking oil during a food distribution Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

Women share peas during a food distribution in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

Zanyiwe Ncube, right, carries a bag of sorghum during a food distribution in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

Zanyiwe Ncube, left, carries a bag of sorghum during a food distribution in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

Women wait in a queue to receive food aid in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

A woman sits a in wheelbarrow while waiting to receive food aid in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

A woman reads out names of people waiting to receive food during a food distribution in Mangwe district southwestern Zimbabwe, amid a severe drought in Zimbabwe,Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

A woman shows her slip while waiting in a queue to receive food aid in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

A woman receives maize meal at a United Nations World Food Programme distribution center in Neno district, southern Malawi. Sunday, March 24, 2024. A new drought has left millions facing hunger in southern Africa as they experience the effects of extreme weather that scientists say is becoming more frequent and more damaging. (AP Photo/Kenneth Jali)

MANGWE, Zimbabwe (AP) — Delicately and with intense concentration, Zanyiwe Ncube poured her small share of precious golden cooking oil into a plastic bottle at a food aid distribution site deep in rural Zimbabwe .

“I don’t want to lose a single drop,” she said.

Her relief at the handout — paid for by the United States government as her southern African country deals with a severe drought — was tempered when aid workers gently broke the news that this would be their last visit.

Ncube and her 7-month-old son she carried on her back were among 2,000 people who received rations of cooking oil, sorghum, peas and other supplies in the Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe. The food distribution is part of a program funded by American aid agency USAID and rolled out by the United Nations’ World Food Programme .

They’re aiming to help some of the 2.7 million people in rural Zimbabwe threatened with hunger because of the drought that has enveloped large parts of southern Africa since late 2023. It has scorched the crops that tens of millions of people grow themselves and rely on to survive, helped by what should be the rainy season.

They can rely on their crops and the weather less and less.

The drought in Zimbabwe, neighboring Zambia and Malawi has reached crisis levels. Zambia and Malawi have declared national disasters . Zimbabwe could be on the brink of doing the same. The drought has reached Botswana and Angola to the west, and Mozambique and Madagascar to the east.

A year ago, much of this region was drenched by deadly tropical storms and floods . It is in the midst of a vicious weather cycle: too much rain, then not enough. It’s a story of the climate extremes that scientists say are becoming more frequent and more damaging, especially for the world’s most vulnerable people.

In Mangwe, the young and the old lined up for food, some with donkey carts to carry home whatever they might get, others with wheelbarrows. Those waiting their turn sat on the dusty ground. Nearby, a goat tried its luck with a nibble on a thorny, scraggly bush.

Ncube, 39, would normally be harvesting her crops now — food for her, her two children and a niece she also looks after. Maybe there would even be a little extra to sell.

The driest February in Zimbabwe in her lifetime, according to the World Food Programme’s seasonal monitor, put an end to that.

“We have nothing in the fields, not a single grain,” she said. “Everything has been burnt (by the drought).”

The United Nations Children’s Fund says there are “overlapping crises” of extreme weather in eastern and southern Africa, with both regions lurching between storms and floods and heat and drought in the past year.

In southern Africa, an estimated 9 million people, half of them children, need help in Malawi. More than 6 million in Zambia, 3 million of them children, are impacted by the drought, UNICEF said. That’s nearly half of Malawi’s population and 30% of Zambia’s.

“Distressingly, extreme weather is expected to be the norm in eastern and southern Africa in the years to come,” said Eva Kadilli, UNICEF’s regional director.

While human-made climate change has spurred more erratic weather globally, there is something else parching southern Africa this year.

El Niño, the naturally occurring climatic phenomenon that warms parts of the Pacific Ocean every two to seven years, has varied effects on the world’s weather. In southern Africa, it means below-average rainfall, sometimes drought, and is being blamed for the current situation.

The impact is more severe for those in Mangwe, where it’s notoriously arid. People grow the cereal grain sorghum and pearl millet, crops that are drought resistant and offer a chance at harvests, but even they failed to withstand the conditions this year.

Francesca Erdelmann, the World Food Programme’s country director for Zimbabwe, said last year’s harvest was bad, but this season is even worse. “This is not a normal circumstance,” she said.

The first few months of the year are traditionally the “lean months” when households run short as they wait for the new harvest. However, there is little hope for replenishment this year.

Joseph Nleya, a 77-year-old traditional leader in Mangwe, said he doesn’t remember it being this hot, this dry, this desperate. “Dams have no water, riverbeds are dry and boreholes are few. We were relying on wild fruits, but they have also dried up,” he said.

People are illegally crossing into Botswana to search for food and “hunger is turning otherwise hard-working people into criminals,” he added.

Multiple aid agencies warned last year of the impending disaster.

Since then, Zambian President Hakainde Hichilema has said that 1 million of the 2.2 million hectares of his country’s staple corn crop have been destroyed. Malawian President Lazarus Chakwera has appealed for $200 million in humanitarian assistance.

The 2.7 million struggling in rural Zimbabwe is not even the full picture. A nationwide crop assessment is underway and authorities are dreading the results, with the number needing help likely to skyrocket, said the WFP’s Erdelmann.

With this year’s harvest a write-off, millions in Zimbabwe, southern Malawi, Mozambique and Madagascar won’t be able to feed themselves well into 2025. USAID’s Famine Early Warning System estimated that 20 million people would require food relief in southern Africa in the first few months of 2024.

Many won’t get that help, as aid agencies also have limited resources amid a global hunger crisis and a cut in humanitarian funding by governments.

As the WFP officials made their last visit to Mangwe, Ncube was already calculating how long the food might last her. She said she hoped it would be long enough to avert her greatest fear: that her youngest child would slip into malnutrition even before his first birthday.

Imray reported from Cape Town, South Africa.

The Associated Press receives financial support for global health and development coverage in Africa from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org .

El Nino-linked drought threatens energy and food supplies in southern Africa with millions at risk

An extreme drought is parching countries across southern Africa, withering crops, licking away at the Zambezi River and threatening energy and food production. The drought has been blamed on the warming El Nino weather pattern and warmer temperatures from climate change.

Climate reporter @SeabrookClimate

Wednesday 3 April 2024 12:24, UK

Zimbabwe is on the brink of declaring a national disaster as a deepening drought leaves millions facing hunger.

A delayed start to the rainy season, followed by general low rainfall, has parching a stretch of land from Angola in the west to Mozambique in the east, devastating harvests relied on by tens of millions and withering waterways.

A huge area across the Zambia, Zimbabwe and Botswana border has just endured its driest February in decades, according to the United Nations' World Food Programme (WFP).

Regional experts say the warming El Nino climate pattern currently releasing heat from the Pacific has brought below average rainfall to southern Africa.

But the experts say this is amplifying the existing impacts of climate change, which is raising temperatures in the region.

"We can't seem to catch a break," said Tomson Phiri, WFP spokesperson for southern Africa.

The lack of rain during a critical phase of the crop cycle exacerbated existing structural problems driving hunger, including poverty and a heavy dependency on rainfed agriculture, he said.

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He added: "As a result, millions of people across the region were facing a food emergency at the height of the lean season between January and March.

"The situation will only get worse before it gets better. Unless actors respond urgently and at scale, the number of people in need will rise exponentially."

An estimated nine million people have been impacted by the drought in Malawi, along with more than six million in Zambia, UNICEF said.

Both countries declared a state of emergency last month.

Officials in Zimbabwe are considering following suit, where approximately 2.7 million people are at risk of hunger.

Read more: 'Famine is setting in' in Gaza, international court rules, ordering Israel to take action

Zambian President Hakainde Hichilema said that almost half of the two million hectares of his country's staple corn crop have been destroyed.

In Zimbabwe's notoriously dry Mangwe region, even drought resistant crops like the cereal grain sorghum and pearl millet have failed to survive this year's hot and dry conditions.

David Gwapedza, a water resources researcher at Rhodes University in South Africa, said water shortages in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, "may lead to outbreaks of diseases such as cholera".

If the drought deepens in Zimbabwe and Zambia, which depend on hydroelectric power, it risks depleting the Zambezi River and "could reduce energy supply to critical sectors such as industry", he warned.

There are different types of droughts and causes are complex and varied.

But scientists at World Weather Attribution - which assesses the causes of extreme weather - are confident climate change is making drought worse in southern Africa.

Sarah Champion MP, chair of the International Development Committee (IDC) of cross-party MPs, said the committee has heard "disturbing evidence" that drought is becoming "incessant and continuous" in southern African countries like Malawi.

The result is "growing, ongoing food insecurity and malnutrition that is stunting children, with a bitter legacy for generations", she said.

"Zimbabwe, once the 'bread basket of Africa', now also faces this chronic food insecurity as a result of the climate change that's bringing disastrous drought and floods."

She said the UK's Foreign and Development Office (FCDO) is "instrumental" in promoting 'climate smart' agricultural practices.

But unless small scale farmers can access these resources, "we will see a lot of mortality", she warned.

Global hunger levels have fallen in recent decades.

The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimated one in three people in developing countries suffered from hunger in 1970. This figure plunged to one in 10 people in 2015, though lately progress has slowed.

Sub-Saharan Africa has consistently suffered the highest rates of undernourishment, which have even risen since 2010.

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Analysis of trends, recurrences, severity and frequency of droughts using standardised precipitation index: Case of OR Tambo District Municipality, Eastern Cape, South Africa

Melezwa nkamisa.

1 Department of Biological and Environmental Science, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Walter Sisulu University, Mthatha, South Africa

Simbarashe Ndhleve

2 Risk and Vulnerability Science Centre, Walter Sisulu University, Mthatha, South Africa

Motebang D.V. Nakin

Asabonga mngeni, hlekani m. kabiti, associated data.

Most of the data used in this study were sourced from the South African Weather Services and all the available data sources are also described in the main body of manuscript. These data sets are available upon special request from the corresponding author (S. N.).

South Africa is susceptible to droughts. However, little documentation exists on drought occurrence in South Africa at national, provincial and municipal administrative boundaries. This study profiles hydrological drought in OR Tambo District Municipality from 1998 to 2018, computing frequency, severity and intensity in order to show areas of high vulnerability. Data used were obtained from South African Weather Services. Standardised precipitation index (SPI) was calculated using the Meteorological Drought Monitor (MDM) software. Results showed a wide variation in monthly precipitation throughout the year. Coastal areas receive higher rainfall than inland municipalities. The study revealed that Nyandeni experienced the highest drought frequency of 62%, Mhlontlo (58%), King Sabatha Dalindyebo Municipality (57%), Ngquza Hill (55%) and Port St Johns Municipality showing the least at 52%. Hydrological drought severity frequency and duration varied between seven days and nine weeks. Drought intensity class exposed the annual average intensity for the five local municipalities represented as follows: KSDM (–0.71), PSJM (–0.99), Ngquza Hill (–0.81), Nyandeni (–0.71) and Mhlontlo (–0.62). The longest drought duration across OR Tambo was experienced in 2014 with durations varying from 3 to 11 weeks across the municipalities. OR Tambo District Municipality is susceptible to hydrological droughts and the extent varies across local municipalities. Results could be used for both adaptation planning and mitigating the impacts of future droughts. In addition, they could assist in guiding allocation of drought relief resources in ways that prioritise drought prone and vulnerable municipality.

Introduction

Agriculture is an important sector in South Africa. It has remained a significant provider of employment in the rural areas, and a major earner of foreign exchange (Bates 2014 ). In South Africa, economic growth in rural areas, where more than 70% of the population is regarded as poor but has access to abundant land, is dependent on agricultural production (Mabogunje 2015 ). About 70% of agricultural output is used as intermediate products in other sectors and this makes it a crucial sector with several multiplier effects on the rest of the economy (McCombie & Thirlwall 2016 ). The sector’s interconnectedness with the larger economy cannot be overemphasised. Agriculture is susceptible to droughts and these droughts have multiple socio-economic effects (Gilmore 2017 ). Droughts are considered major natural hazards causing destructive impact on livelihoods, the environment as well as the economies (Alexander 2017 ). They have both direct and indirect socio-economic impacts and their effects are more damaging for economies driven primarily by agriculture. The nexus amongst droughts and climate change, agriculture, food security and poverty reduction stands out prominently in the current theoretical and empirical debates on economic development (Gilmore 2017 ). Droughts negatively impact agricultural production, thereby affecting the four dimensions of food security, that is, availability, stability, access and utilisation (Cheeseman 2016 ). Studies from many developing countries strongly concur that rural economic growth and wide-spread poverty reduction require increased production in agriculture (McGlade et al. 2019 ). Many studies concur that droughts negatively impact agricultural production and efforts to reduce poverty (Udmale 2014 ).

South Africa is a naturally dry country that is highly vulnerable to droughts and also a major producer of agricultural goods in Southern Africa (Adams 2014 ). It is self-sufficient in a range of food commodities and usually produces exportable surpluses (Gilmore 2017 ). Southern African countries, such as Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Zambia and Mozambique, significantly rely on agricultural imports from South Africa. Droughts have multiple effects on agriculture ranging from crop losses, lower yields in crop and livestock production, increased livestock deaths, increases in insect infestation and plant and animal diseases, damage to fish habitat, forest and range fires, land degradation and soil erosion (Udmale 2014 ). Furthermore, there is a compelling body of knowledge that links droughts to other epidemics like famine, diseases and land degradation globally (Adams 2014 ). Adams ( 2014 ) further stated that droughts impact on human health through increased risk of food and water shortages, increased risk of malnutrition and higher risk of water and food borne diseases. Thus, drought represents a constant threat to health, food security and livelihoods (Davies 2016 ). Despite being a major regional player in agriculture, droughts are regular and recurrent in South Africa (Davis & Vincent 2017 ). Droughts have a recurrent characteristic feature; and this is especially the case for South Africa because of its highly variable climate (Tauma et al. 2015 ).

South Africa’s annual average rainfall is approximately 450 mm and that makes the country prone to recurrent droughts (Hirooka et al. 2019 ). Drought periods can be characterised from a few hours (short-term) to millennia (long-term) and there are four categories, namely, meteorological drought, hydrological drought, agricultural drought and socio-economic drought (Botai et al. 2016 ).

Hydrological drought is associated with the deficiency of water on the surface or subsurface because of shortfall in precipitation and is characterised by persistent reduction in runoff (Gu et al. 2020 ). Meteorological drought implies rainfall deficiency where the precipitation is reduced by 25% from normal in any given area. It is characterised by lack of precipitation over an extended period and is mainly determined by climatic conditions and atmospheric circulations (Alvala et al. 2017 ). It is defined usually on the basis of the degree of dryness in comparison to some ‘normal’ or average amount and the duration of the dry period and its definitions are considered as region specific (Miralles et al. 2019 ). Agricultural drought links various meteorological or hydrological characteristics to agricultural impacts. It focuses on precipitation shortages, and differences amongst actual potential evapotranspiration, soil, soil water deficit and reduced ground water and reservoir levels help to learn more on agriculture (Bae et al. 2019 ; Miralles et al. 2019 ). Agricultural drought is characterised by reduction of soil moisture following reduction of precipitation, runoff and soil moisture. This is usually associated with the shortage of water supply for population, livestock, industry, ecology, environment may become much more serious. Socio-economic drought is associated with the demand and supply aspect of economic goods together with the elements of meteorological, hydrological and agricultural drought. Primarily, socio-economic drought is influenced by both natural and anthropogenic systems and is affected mostly by human activities (Pedro-Monzonis et al. 2015 ). Socio-economic drought occurs when there is reduction of precipitation, runoff and soil moisture, and there is shortage of water supply for population, livestock, industry, ecology and environment. Socio-economic definitions of drought associate the supply and demand of some economic good with elements of meteorological, hydrological and agricultural drought (Alvala et al. 2017 ).

The effects of drought are not uniform with regard to time and place as their nature is indicated by precipitation, temperature, stream flow, groundwater and reservoir levels, soil moisture and snowpack (Botai et al. 2016 ). In addition, droughts are triggered by different factors and so are their frequency and intensity. One school of thought argued that some of the problems caused by drought are difficult to avoid whilst some are avoidable through proper planning and effective drought responses (Staupe-Delgado & Kruke 2017 ). Thus, the need for comprehensive information aided by a comprehensive research that seeks to provide baseline information on drought cannot be overemphasised (Mwangi 2016 ). There is very little documentation on the incidences of drought in South Africa at national level and at its various administrative boundaries that can aid proper planning. South Africa is likely to experience more frequent and severe droughts in future (Hirooka et al. 2019 ). It is highly probable that increased climate volatility will result in increased frequency and intensity of droughts. However, to date, very little research has been performed to profile droughts in South Africa. Profiling droughts has multiple benefits including identifying the most vulnerable areas for the purpose of improving monitoring, planning, raising awareness and interventions. This could also help in the delineation of major areas facing drought risk for effective management plans formulation by government authorities. Therefore, this study aims to establish baseline information on the frequency and intensity of droughts in South Africa. The general intention of this study is to comprehensively profile all the droughts that occurred in OR Tambo District Municipality (ORTDM) during the period between 1998 and 2018. The study specifically focuses on computing the frequency, severity and intensity of the droughts in South Africa’s poorest province, Eastern Cape. This information could be used in the development of a comprehensive and flexible drought management strategy to effectively reduce the impact of future droughts.

Materials and methods

The ORTDM occupies the eastern coastal portion of the Eastern Cape province, South Africa. The district lies along the coastline of the Indian Ocean stretching for up to 160 km (Morgan 2017 ). The district extends over a geographical area of 15946.84 km² and incorporates five local municipalities, referred to by Figure 1 (Morgan 2017 ). ORTDM lies between the coordinates of 32°46’31”S and 21°23’29”E (Mlanjeni 2014 ). OR Tambo is classified as a Category C2 municipality, indicating a largely rural character and low urbanisation rate. In addition to agriculture, the other economic sectors are community services, trade, finance, transport, manufacturing and construction (Null 2018 ). Its suitable terrain and many river valleys provide irrigable land, abundant water resources, large tracts of grazing land, suitable pasture species for stock grazing, and a large number of stock owned by rural communities (Davies 2014 ). The district has the richest natural resources and the most fertile soils and favourable climatic conditions. Agricultural practices are intense although climate dependent (Thomas 2014 ). These have diverse vegetation types ranging from grasslands, thicket, forests and bushveld (Munn 2018 ). Mlanjeni ( 2014 ) notes that drought incidents negatively impact agricultural production of the OR Tambo district and contribute to food insecurity. The OR Tambo district receives plenty of rainfall and increased humidity during summer. Winters are colder especially in inland areas. The district’s climatic conditions are moderate to high rainfall areas, mainly along its sub-tropical coast and in pockets of mountainous areas (Narloch & Bangalore 2018 ). The climatic conditions of OR Tambo district have warm, temperate, predominantly frost-free conditions. The OR Tambo district enjoys a high level of annual sunshine, and in summer, temperatures range from 16 ºC to 28 ºC whilst winter temperatures range from 7 ºC to 20 ºC. Winter months fall between April and August whilst summer temperatures are usually highest between November and April (Slattery 1998 ). The people in the OR Tambo district enjoy four seasons of the year namely, summer, winter, spring and autumn and they are characterised by different weather conditions ranging from hot, to cool, mild, windy and cold conditions.

Distribution of weather stations in OR Tambo District Municipality.

Data sources

Data used on this study were obtained at South African Weather Services (SAWS) in Pretoria. The study employed daily, monthly and annual precipitation data gathered from the SAWS for the period 1998 to 2018 and recorded the data using both automatic and manual weather stations located across ORTDM. There are a number of weather stations in the ORTDM. Before 1979, the municipality had 17 operating weather stations to assist in weather recording and forecasting. Advances in technology led to the addition of three automatic weather stations in ORTDM. The automatic weather stations are located in Port St Johns and King Sabatha Dalindyebo municipalities, see Figure 1 . According to Mlanjeni ( 2014 ), manual weather stations are not advanced because they had a majority of disadvantages such as missing data and lacked coherence. Advances in technology and the introduction of automatic weather stations became an alternative, which is a more reliable solution. Table 1 shows all the weather stations in ORTDM, their spatial locations and type categorised into automatic and manual weather stations. Figure 1 shows the map for ORTDM, the local municipalities and the weather stations, both automatic and manual weather stations.

Rainfall weather stations in OR Tambo District Municipality with Global Positioning System (GPS) co-ordinates.

Source : Google Earth.

Data analysis

Rainfall data were used to compute average annual precipitation for the period 1998 to 2018, determining periods and areas with below normal and above normal average precipitation. Standardised precipitation index (SPI) was used to compute drought frequency, severity and intensity to expose the high drought risk areas. Various indices have been developed to assess the onset, severity, frequency, intensity and end of droughts (Mahlalela, Blamey & Reason 2018 ). The selection and application of these methods are based on the anticipated objectives, nature of the indicator, local conditions, data availability and data validity (Gerwin et al. 2018 ; Gqwede 2018 ; Maza et al. 2019 ). This study employed the SPI because of its popularity and ability to synthesise long-term data records of precipitation. This study’s rainfall data spanned over 20 years. A number of studies employed the SPI and commended the index (Gqwede 2018 ; Sprecher 2017 ). In addition to being widely recommended, this study’s choice of SPI was also influenced by the nature of the available data.

In order for the results to be precise, understandable and presentable, the Meteorological Drought Monitor (MDM) software programme was used to compute the SPI values for the moving average at 3 months, 6 months and 12 months (yearly) for all the stations within ORTDM. Simple imputation method was employed to replace missing precipitation data for stations where missing data were less than 5% and observed data of neighbouring stations or reference stations were used to replace missing data where more than 5% of data were missing (Aieb et al. 2019 ). The yearly SPI was presented graphically to show the months which ORTDM was vulnerable to droughts throughout the referenced years of study (1998–2018). The MDM output results generated the frequency, intensity of droughts, drought durations, including minimum and maximum drought time lags. Meteorological Drought Monitor software was used to compute both the 3 months SPI moving average (3-SPI) and 6 months SPI moving average (6-SPI).

Results and findings were presented graphically using Microsoft Excel, and Microsoft Word was used to draw tables that presented the results in order to compare the outcomes across ORTDM. One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to compare SPI values and MDM output for all the local municipalities in ORTDM to uncover the ones that experienced most drought occurrences, level of severity, frequency and intensity and highlight the most vulnerable areas within ORTDM.

Interpretation of standardised precipitation index

Negative SPI values represent rainfall deficit, whereas positive SPI values indicate rainfall surplus. The intensity of drought was classified according to the magnitude of negative SPI values such that the larger the negative SPI values were, the more serious the event was (Otkin et al. 2019 ). Table 2 below is an SPI interpretation and shows the level of wetness and dryness in the rainfall data of ORTDM. The findings and results of MDM output were interpreted using the SPI Table and these conformed to the SPI interpretation table.

Standardised precipitation index interpretation table.

Source: Otkin, J.A., Zhong, Y., Hunt, E.D., Basara, J., Svoboda, M., Anderson, M.C. et al., 2019, ‘Assessing the evolution of soil moisture and vegetation conditions during a flash drought-flash recovery sequence over the south-central United States’, Journal of Hydrometeorology 20(3), 549–562. https://doi.org/10.1175/JHM-D-18-0171.1

Ethical considerations

This article followed all ethical standards for research without direct contact with human or animal subjects.

Results and discussions

This section presents the results of precipitation and standardised precipitation index (SPI) trends in ORTDM for the period 1998–2018. The first part of the results is the precipitation graphs for both monthly average and yearly average precipitation for the five local municipalities in the ORTDM. The second section focuses on the presentation of 3 and 6 months SPI results for ORTDM. The results are presented for 17 weather stations located across all the five local municipalities. The SPI values were further analysed to give drought severity and drought classification information for all the municipalities. Results for drought intensity include average drought intensity, maximum drought intensity, average drought duration, maximum drought duration and most intense drought duration per local municipality. The results also present areas that are vulnerable to both agricultural and hydrological droughts during the referenced period.

Average monthly precipitation for OR Tambo district municipalities

Figure 2A – E below depicts the average monthly precipitation for all the five local municipalities in ORTDM. The KSD municipality received its highest rainfall in summer during the months December, January and February with an average monthly precipitation of 85.6 mm. The average rainfall in summer was higher than the monthly average precipitation of 70.2 mm reported by Mditshwa and Hendrickse ( 2017 ) for the same municipality. June is reportedly the driest month in the KSD municipality and the presented results concur with the previous finding by Mahlalela et al. ( 2018 ). The KSD municipality has an annual average precipitation 68.8 mm and this is 1.1 mm less than the annual average precipitation of ORTDM.

Average monthly precipitation in local municipalities of the OR Tambo District Municipality.

Figure 2B depicts the average monthly precipitation patterns of Ngquza Hill for the same period (1998–2018). Ngquza Hill also receives most rainfall in December, January and February, receives the least amount of precipitation during winter (May – August) and has a monthly average precipitation of 132.7 mm and an average annual precipitation of 76.2 mm. Coastal areas along Indian Ocean are influenced by warm Mozambique current and as a result winters are wetter and warmer than the areas inland (ed. Thill 2019 ). Ngquza Hill is a coastal municipality and it is the second of all the local municipalities in the ORTDM that received the highest rainfall. Its average annual and average monthly precipitation was higher than the other three local municipalities in ORTDM except Port St Johns municipality. The average monthly precipitation for Port St Johns municipality is 88.0 mm and 89.9 mm is the annual average precipitation. Port St Johns municipality winters are not as dry as the rest of the other local municipalities in ORTDM and it receives sufficient rainfall and was not susceptible to hydrological drought. Nyandeni Local Municipality and Mhlontlo Local Municipality received an average monthly precipitation of 65.1 mm and 64.1 mm and average annual precipitation of 64.9 mm and 66.5 mm, respectively. They both receive extremely lower rainfall in winter. Indices used to monitor monthly trends of climate in the Eastern Cape detected that areas inland are drier and colder than coastal areas (Mahlalela et al. 2018 ). Mhlontlo local municipality received reduced precipitation in winter season. Mhlontlo municipality experienced its driest period in 2014 and the authorities there reported loss of livestock and reduced yields on crop production (Wambua 2019 ).

Monthly standardised precipitation index and drought severity for OR Tambo District Municipality

Agricultural practices in ORTDM are a primary human activity; therefore, it is important to compute the 3-month SPI to reflect short- and medium-term moisture conditions that are a basis to agricultural droughts. The 3 months SPI helped to detect soil moisture, groundwater and reservoir storage (Cammalleri et al. 2019 ). When SPI is computed for shorter accumulation periods, in this case a period of 3 months, it is used as an indicator of reduced soil moisture and this has an important impact on agriculture and crops, especially during farming seasons. Figure 3A – E below shows the graphical representation of the 3 months SPI values distribution for all the weather stations in all the five local municipalities in the ORTDM for the period 1998–2018.

Three months standardised precipitation index and drought severity in the OR Tambo District Municipality.

Figure 3A – E illustrates that all the five municipalities are susceptible to droughts of varying magnitude and frequency and the variation is noticeable in specific areas serviced by different weather stations. The presented graphs also show incidence of extreme to severe droughts of negative 3 months SPI values above −2.5. The incidence of meteorological, hydrological and agricultural droughts in the district municipality is not peculiar. Despite high negative drought severity figures across all the weather stations, the presented bell curves reflect higher proportion of near normal and moderately wet conditions. This is the case for all areas as per their respective weather stations. Altın, Sarış and ltın ( 2019 ) and SAWS ( 2018 ) reported similar drought patterns indicating that some parts of the country experience below-normal rainfall at varying frequencies with some areas being drier than others during the same period. These results concur with a number of previous studies in the Eastern Cape and South Africa in general (Altin et al. 2019 ). Mhlontlo Local Municipality is one of the driest inland municipalities in ORTDM and experienced multiple droughts negatively impacting agriculture and water sources between 1998 and 2018 (Dotse 2019). Overall, ORTDM is susceptible to droughts of varying intensity and the results of the 3 months SPI across the entire district municipality confirm this. The SPI drought categories from 1998 to 2018 of ORTDM show that some of the levels of hydrological droughts experienced have the potential to cause some devastating impact such as shortage of drinking water and reduced crop yields. Droughts negatively impact river flows, dam levels, crop yields and animal life (Jimmy et al. 2019 ). The presented spatial analyses of drought severity, recurrence nature of droughts and the level of variance across different areas could be used as a tool for identification of the most drought prone areas and drought periods and these could assist in resource allocation for drought preparedness.

Weather stations in the same municipalities show significant differences in SPI values. This, therefore, implies that the quality of drought data and information could be improved by increasing the density of weather stations in an area. The KSDM has the highest number of weather stations and the difference in SPI values across KSD municipality shows that the same municipality can experience varying degrees of drought in one period and this should not be generalised per municipality. A similar conclusion was made by Lucinda and Baez-Villaneuva ( 2019 ). When conducting a drought-related study, it is very important to look into the weather stations and compare the findings rather than generalising. Some critically affected areas might be overlooked because of a collective description of areas and results (Forbes & Cyr 2019 ).

Months moving average standardised precipitation index for OR Tambo District Municipality (1998–2018)

The following section quantifies the amount of the time each of the five local municipalities in the ORTDM experienced drought and puts them in different categories using both 3 and 6 months SPI values. Tables 3 and ​ and4 4 show 3 and 6 months SPI results for all the five local municipalities, respectively. The SPI results have been tabulated according to drought severity class of moderately dry, severely dry and extremely dry categories and computed for each municipality.

Drought severity class table for OR Tambo District Municipality and all its local municipalities for 3 months standardised precipitation index during 1998–2018.

KSD, King Sabata Dalindyebo; PSJ, Port St Johns.

Drought severity class table for OR Tambo District Municipality and all its local municipalities for 6 months moving standardised precipitation index during 1998–2018.

The summarised results in Table 3 show the summarised results per municipality. The results show that all the local municipalities in ORTDM experienced droughts of varying severity at different time proportions. The KSD Local Municipality has the highest probability of experiencing a drought with a percentage of 61.2%, followed by Mhlontlo, Ngquza Hill and lastly PSJ and Nyandeni with equal probabilities of 37%. Using the 3 months SPI values and summing up all the drought periods when the SPI is below −1, ORTDM has a 56.5% chance of experiencing drought. Agriculture is the main economic activity in ORTDM and October, November and December are the growing months. A more than 50% chance of drought in area has important implications on livelihoods and food security in areas where agriculture is the main livelihood. The higher incidence of droughts in OR Tambo was also reported by Bae et al. ( 2019 ).

In addition to results on 3 months SPI drought severity classes presented in Table 3 , Table 4 presents results of the 6 months SPI for the same municipality. Unlike the 3 months SPI results which estimated a probability of 56.5% susceptibility to droughts for ORTDM, the 6 months SPI estimated a probability of 62%. Thus, the district is likely to experience more cumulative 6 months’ droughts than 3 months’ droughts. These results are in line with a study by Jimmy et al. ( 2019 ) who noted that OR Tambo DM experiences hydrological droughts that intensify into agricultural droughts in a period of 6 months. These results also confirmed reports documented by the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF) on negative anomalies perceived in ORTDM for both on surface and subsurface water (Mditshwa & Hendrickse 2017 ). A report by Bae et al. ( 2019 ) highlighted only six agricultural droughts that occurred in ORTDM and these occurred in 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017 (Bae et al. 2019 ). However, none of the previous studies presented drought reports according to drought severity class of moderately dry, severely dry and extremely dry categories. It is important to note that literature has vast information on droughts in the Eastern Cape and ORTDM as shown by multiple citations above but the existing information lacks some level of standardisation that can warrant comparability across both space and time. This owes to the fact that drought studies lack standardisation in terms of methodology, classification and scales used, a challenge also mentioned by Masupha and Moeletsi ( 2017 ). Widespread adoption and SPI or any methodology that promotes the calculation of the probability of droughts in any area could not be overemphasised, especially, for drought preparedness purposes.

Standardised precipitation index data and analyses characterise droughts in a way that detect both the onset and cessation of drought incidents, something that other indices are unable to do (Cook 2019 ). It also determines drought severity, frequency and intensity of droughts and identifies areas of high vulnerability. Information on average drought intensity and duration is crucial for decision-making purposes. Table 5 presents minimum and maximum drought intensity, average drought intensity and maximum drought duration for all the five local municipalities in ORTDM.

Drought intensity class for OR Tambo District Municipality during 1998–2018.

KSD, King Sabata Dalindyebo; PSJ, Port St Johns; SPI, Standardised precipitation index; DDI(M), duration of drought intensity (maximum).

Average drought intensity ranges from −0.62 to −0.99. Ngquza Hill Local Municipality is a coastal municipality. The 3 months SPI values for Ngquza Hill are in contrast to the known supposition and theory that coastal areas are wetter than inland areas (Sotsha 2013 ). The SPI detects the onset and end of the drought. Despite presenting a mean drought intensity that is close to normal, all the local municipalities experience long periods of drought ranging from 30 to 80 days of consecutive dry days. Mhlontlo local municipality experienced the longest drought duration of 80 days and all the municipalities experienced their longest drought duration in 2014. The results of the 2014 SPI further confirm the results by Mafongoya et al. ( 2019 ) who assert that in 2014, the whole African continent experienced its worst drought in more than 50 years with life-threatening and devastating impacts. The two coastal municipalities, PSJ and Ngquza Hill, have relatively lower average drought duration. The presented outcome confirms that Nyandeni is the driest municipality as it experiences the maximum intensity and lengthy drought duration. The results agree with the previous studies which asserted that areas inland are drier than coastal areas as noted by Mackay and Gross ( 2019 ) in drought studies conducted in Australia. In South Africa, the years 2014 and 2015 were drought years and Port St Johns Local Municipality was amongst local municipalities in ORTDM that experienced water stress and reported a reduction in water levels in its water bodies and reduced crop yields in farms (Mantsho 2018 ).

The SPI results could provide significant statistics that could be considered for drought monitoring, drought resources allocation and drought preparedness. When distributing drought relief aid, government departments and aid agencies should prioritise inland municipalities. In addition, these results are crucial for agricultural purpose. Accordingly, Nyandeni and Mhlontlo should be highly prioritised when it comes to agricultural drought intervention strategies such as introduction of drought tolerant plants and animals. This should be the case, especially when agriculture is a key livelihood activity. The maximum drought duration for Mhlontlo, Nyandeni and KSD in ORTDM shows that these municipalities are vulnerable and high-risk municipalities and the same was echoed by Dotse ( 2016 ). The findings of this study confirmed the hypothesis of this study that ORTDM is susceptible to hydrological droughts and furthermore, revealed the extent of drought effect, frequency, level of severity and intensity and detailed the areas of higher vulnerability.

This study analyed the findings and results of drought incidents that occurred in the ORTDM during 1998–2018. The SPI output assisted in profiling and tabulating the drought incidents of ORTDM during 1998–2018, identifying the most vulnerable drought areas in ORTDM, areas of high drought intensity and most severely affected areas in the district. Average monthly precipitation for all the five local municipalities confirms that ORTDM receives more rainfall in summer than in winter and coastal areas receive high rainfall than inland municipalities. However, there are similarities in the distributions of yearly precipitation amongst all the local municipalities. All local municipalities received high precipitation during summer during the months December, January and February, and low precipitation during winter months (May, June and July). The findings of this study confirmed the hypothesis of this study that ORTDM is susceptible to hydrological droughts and furthermore, revealed the extent of drought effect, frequency, level of severity and intensity and detailed the areas of higher vulnerability. Nyandeni is the highest drought risk area in ORTDM, followed by Mhlontlo, King Sabatha Dalindyebo, Ngquza Hill and Port St Johns Local Municipality. Agricultural droughts are experienced in Nyandeni, Mhlontlo and KSDM; conversely hydrological droughts are experienced in Port St Johns Local Municipality and Ngquza Hill Local Municipality. The results could be used as a guide for drought adaptation planning and mitigation measures. The SPI could be a useful tool when forecasting and estimating the frequency, duration and intensity of droughts. However, emphasis should be placed on improving the quality of data as this is the key in improving the quality of its outcome. The generated information could add value in decision-making for the Department of Disaster Management in the ORTDM and other relevant stakeholders.

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge the South African Weather Services that provided the data used in this study. This study was made possible through the funding from the South African National Research Foundation (NRF) and the Department of Science and Innovation (DSI) through the Walter Sisulu University’s Risk and Vulnerability Science Centre.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no financial or personal relationships that may have inappropriately influenced them in writing this article.

Authors’ contributions

M.K. is a master’s student who conducted the research. S.N. and H.M.K. were mainly responsible for technical input, and the development and writing of the article. M.D.V.N and A.M were responsible for research supervision.

Funding information

This study was made possible by the funding from the South African NRF and DSI through the Walter Sisulu University’s Risk and Vulnerability Science Centre.

Data availability

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any affiliated agency of the authors.

How to cite this article: Nkamisa, M., Ndhleve, S., Nakin, V.M., Mngeni, A. & Kabiti, H.M., 2022, ‘Analysis of trends, recurrences, severity and frequency of droughts using standardised precipitation index: Case of OR Tambo District Municipality, Eastern Cape, South Africa’, Jàmbá: Journal of Disaster Risk Studies 14(1), a1147. https://doi.org/10.4102/jamba.v14i1.1147

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH

Perception of agricultural drought resilience in South Africa: A case of smallholder livestock farmers

Yonas T. Bahta

Department of Agricultural Economics, Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa

Correspondence

Worldwide drought has significance and continues to pose long-lasting effects on the agricultural sector, including South Africa. The recurring drought is a major challenge to smallholder livestock farmers in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa. This study assesses the perception of smallholder livestock farmers towards agricultural drought resilience. The study utilised a perception index score using primary data collected from 207 smallholder livestock farmers following a structured questionnaire survey and multistage sampling procedures. The study found that the average perception index of the role of social networks and government to enhance agricultural drought resilience was negative, which implied that their role in enhancing resilience towards agricultural drought was insufficient. However, the perception of smallholder livestock farmers on the role of social networks was lower than the role of government. This study recommends coordination and cooperation amongst all role players to reinforce strategies to enhance smallholder livestock farmers' resilience. This includes coordinator amongst the local, provincial government, African Farmers' Association of South Africa, extension officers, private sectors, monitoring agencies in terms of reliable early warning information and communication amongst decision-makers. Collaboration amongst government departments at the national and provincial levels should be strengthening to enhance farmer's resilience. The collaboration includes the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries at the national level, Provincial Departments of Agriculture, National and Provincial Disaster Management Centres, South African Weather Service and Department of Water Affairs. Smallholder livestock farmers' awareness of the significance of social networking and government participation should be promoted.

Keywords : agricultural drought; government; resilience; smallholder livestock farmers; social networks.

Introduction

Resilience 1 is an important concept across all disciplines for examining responses to changes in human (including transformability, adaptability and persistence) and ecological systems (Cote & Nightingale 2011; Downes et al. 2013; Folke et al. 2010; Rockenbauch & Sakdapolrak 2017). Resilience can encompass many spheres, including development, residence, climate, community and disaster (Folke et al. 2010). Agricultural drought, 2 specifically recurrent agricultural drought, is a disaster that deteriorates smallholder farmers' 3 resilience capabilities in many aspects. Furthermore, agricultural drought has severe implications for smallholder farmers in social, environmental and economic terms.

Smallholder agriculture, in general, and smallholder livestock farmers, in particular, are characterised by small production volumes of variable quality that reflect limited access to inputs, market, information, insurance, infrastructure and government support (such as assistance from extension offices), as a result, affect the resilience of smallholder livestock producers (Bahta, Jordaan & Muyambo 2016; Jordaan 2011; Von Loeper et al. 2016). Extension and advisory services may provide an opportunity for strengthening the resilience of smallholder livestock producers by increasing their access to tangible and intangible resources, such as inputs and information regarding weather and climate change, market prices, regulatory structures, quality standards and consumer demands so that farmers can make informed decisions. For mitigating risk, extension services can link up with various stakeholders, including insurance providers, input dealers and other market players, to enhance the resilience of smallholder farmers (Davis, Babu & Blom et al. 2014). Infrastructure such as fencing, breeding infrastructure, adequate market facilities and transportation system (rail and road) is most important for market development in terms of distribution to enhance the resilience of smallholder livestock farmers (McDermott et al. 2010).

In South Africa, livestock production has great potential to alleviate household food insecurity and poverty (Mapiliyao et al. 2012). The livestock industry contributes approximately 48% of South Africa's agricultural output, employs approximately 500 000 people nationwide and occupies 53% of agricultural land (Blignaut et al. 2014; Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries [DAFF] 2016, 2018). According to the president of Agriculture Northern Cape, as cited by Coleman (2017), livestock farmers in the Northern Cape recently lost entire herds and reduced their livestock numbers by more than 30% in the worst drought since 1982. The 2015/2016 year is the worst drought in South Africa, in general, and Northern Cape Province, in particular. The situation was aggravated by insufficient drought relief schemes, inadequate policies as well a lack of disaster measures and collaboration amongst different role players (Mare, Bahta & Niekerk 2018). Resilient livestock farmers can respond, absorb and recover from drought effects. Jones and Thornton (2009) highlighted that building resilience is essential in reducing agricultural production vulnerability to the variability of climate shocks. Consequently, assessing the perception of smallholder livestock farmers towards agricultural drought resilience is vital for the design and development or improvement of agricultural drought resilience strategies.

Existing international studies, such as those by Marshall (2007), address the question of whether policy perception can erode or enhance the resilience of commercial farmers using survey and descriptive statistics and found that a negative perception of policy was found to significantly and adversely influence the behaviour and emotional response of commercial farmers and influences their resilience. Caldwell and Boyd (2009) quantitatively analysed the impact of drought with emphasis on the concept of resilience in times of stress using a survey and revealed that a wide range of coping strategies was being utilised by these families from problem-focussed coping, optimism and positive appraisal to less adaptive strategies such as cognitive dissonance, denial and avoidance of negative social influences. Buikstra et al. (2010) assessed components of community and individual resilience using a participatory approach, and they found that recognising environmental and economic factors, infrastructure and support services, as enhancing resilience. Darnhofer, Fairweather & Moller (2011) assessed the resilience of family farms concerning the role of farm type and ecological dynamics, and they found that how resilience theory applied to farming may provide a more comprehensive route to achieving sustainability and offers rules of thumb as guides to building farm resilience. Jacobi et al. (2015) assessed agroecosystem resilience quantitatively and found that it enhances the social process of farmers' integration into cooperatives, and their reorientation towards organic principles and diversified agroforestry enhances their resilience. Darnhofer et al. (2016) assessed the resilience of family farms, that is, the ability to persist over the long-term through buffering shocks and adapting to change. They found that a relational approach would thus contribute to overcoming a one-sided focus on states and stability, shifting attention to the patterns of relations that enable transformational change.

In the African context, studies, such as those by Hudson (2002); Shewamake (2008); Slegers (2008); Gandure, Walker and Botha (2013) and others concentrated on preparedness, impact on and response by the farming community to drought, perceptions on climate change, the inter-relationship between land degradation and drought, rainfall and drought, scarcity of water and coping responses. There are no many studies on the perception of agricultural drought resilience. Bahta et al. (2016) assessed crop and livestock communal farmers' perception of agricultural drought; application of resilience theory to farming with an insight into drought vulnerability to their farming operations, gender, social network, the role of government, stress and security and safety in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa and found out that perceptions held by communal farmers indicate that they receive inadequate government support; they do not consider social networks as being effectively involved in drought risk reduction, gender stereotyping and psychological stress and experience high levels of stock theft and insecurity in their farming.

However, no study assessed agricultural drought resilience and smallholder livestock farmers' perception of agricultural drought resilience in relation to social networks and households. Therefore, this study attempts to fill this gap in the literature and knowledge with respect to agricultural drought resilience, social networks and participation of the government. The study's main aim was to assess the perception of smallholder livestock farmers towards agricultural drought resilience. The findings of this study will help policymakers formulate appropriate policy interventions that boost smallholder livestock farmer's resilience to agricultural drought.

Literature review

Natural disasters such as drought constitute direct and indirect threats to the livelihoods and food security of smallholder farmers in the world (FAO 2017). Often, the effects of drought gather gradually over a certain period and can remain for quite a long time after it has departed; it is difficult to determine when the drought started and ended (Wilhite 2000). Climate change exposes rural households and farmers to new and unfamiliar circumstances (Osbahr et al. 2008). Globally, livestock production provides food and livelihood to approximately one billion poor people, mostly in dry and infertile regions where other agricultural practices are less practicable (Rojas-Downing et al. 2017). Different barriers and motivators influence livelihood responses, which comprise gender, social norms, ethnic groups, household assets, individual perceptions, class and networks (Osbahr et al. 2008).

In South Africa, drought has a major impact on livestock production. Drought leads to the reduction of natural grazing (grass) and water. Over the years, the livestock numbers have been increasing. However, the livestock numbers declined slightly in 2016. Livestock numbers declined by 1, 21% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) from 44, 4 million livestock numbers in 2012 to 42, 3 million livestock numbers in 2016. The decline in the number of livestock in South Africa could be attributed to the severe drought, amongst others, which left most farmers - especially smallholder farmers - vulnerable (Matlou & Bahta 2019).

Droughts may be identical in terms of their intensity, duration and spatial characteristics for a specific region or area, but the effects will not be the same. According to Dellal and McCarl (2010), the effects of drought are based on the frequency, severity, degree and vulnerability of the region or area. The effect of drought can be seen from environmental, economic, social and food security aspects.

The development of resilient agricultural systems is essential because many individuals, communities or societies rely upon the provisioning of ecosystem services such as fodder, food and fuel for their livelihoods (Lin 2011). To manage and enhance resilience, individuals, communities and organisations need to anticipate and prepare for each climate-related challenge (Marshall 2010). Resilience presents a new and valuable context of analysis and perception on how the environment, communities, organisations and individuals can adjust in a changing world facing several uncertainties and difficulties (Folke et al. 2016).

To enhance smallholder farmers' resilience through social network and government coordination of agricultural drought resilience, collaboration, community involvement, be a member of cooperatives, assistance from relatives (family members) and assistance from neighbours is crucial. Social networks can be either formal (e.g. the farmers' associations such as African farmers Association of South Africa and drought mitigation clubs) or informal (e.g. church groups, women's groups, stokvels, burial societies, extended family networks and neighbourhood groups) (Wongbusarakum & Loper 2011). They meet and train each other on agricultural drought resilience and mitigation strategies and support each other when drought occurs. Members of social networks share mutual assistance and support when the need arises, such as providing farming knowledge and food in inadequate food supplies. They can call on each other for help and have rights and access to some resources because of their group membership status (Hassen 2008). Iglesias, Moneo and Quiroga (2007) established that when farmers participate in local institutions, their resilience to agricultural drought enhances significantly reduced. Their involvement in planning and other activities influences the social networks in such a way that they will develop social capital to strengthen their resilience.

Smallholder livestock farmers with a strong social network system cope better with drought than those without any or those with weak and ineffective social networks (Stone 2000). Hassen (2008) indicated that members of the social network would be able to help each other and access resources. A robust institutional background is essential for the promotion of resilience in the face of hazardous events. Information could then be disseminated easily to the public, ensuring the facilitation of emergency preparedness, pre-disaster planning and enhance resilience of smallholder livestock farmers (Vincent 2004).

Methodology

The Northern Cape Province is the largest province of South Africa, comprising 36 million hectares (29.5%) of South Africa's total land area (Bapela & Mariaba 2002; Dludla 2014). The study focussed on the France Baard District Municipality (FBDM), consisting of four local district municipalities, namely Dikgatlong, Magareng, Phokwane and Sol Plaatjie ( Figure 1 ). According to the census of 2011, the FBDM has a population of 382 087 with 95 931 households, which accounted for 31.8% of the Northern Cape households with 3.98 people per household. The local municipality of Dikgatlong, Magareng, Phokwane and Sol Plaatje had a population size of 46 842, 24 203, 63 000 and 248 042, respectively (France Baard District Municipality [FBDM] 2016).

Sampling procedure

A multiple-stage sampling procedure was employed. Firstly, the Northern Cape Province was chosen from the nine provinces of South Africa. According to Statistics South Africa (Stats SA 2016), approximately 75% of agricultural households in 2016 were involved in livestock production, compared to mixed farming (10%) and crop only (15%) in the Northern Cape. In 2016, Eastern Cape (65%), Western Cape (18%), Free State (26%), KwaZulu-Natal (48%), North West (47%), Gauteng (10%), Mpumalanga (34%) and Limpopo (39%) of the agricultural households engaged in the livestock production. With other South African provinces, the province was declared a disaster zone in 2017/2018 by the South African government because of agricultural drought. Secondly, four district municipalities in the province were randomly selected using balloting and included Dikgatlong, Magareng, Sol Plaatjie and Phokwane.

Appropriate sample sizes were calculated for continuous and categorical data (Cochran 1997). The questionnaire included both continuous and categorical data, which comprised socio-economics characteristics, the role of a social network, the role of government and drought vulnerability. Thus, to ensure that the sample size was appropriate, a simple random sampling formula was applied (Bartlett, Kotrlik & Higgins 2001; Cochran 1997). Based on the formula, 207 smallholder livestock farmers were selected from 868 farmers registered to receive drought relief from government in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa for face-to-face interviews conducted from July to September 2018 using a structured questionnaire (Northern Cape Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries 2018). Some of the questionnaires (role of government and social network) are available in Appendix 1 ).

Data analysis

The data were analysed using the perception index score for agricultural drought resilience. A perception index score is a composite index that ranks social indicators such as the role of social networks and government, based on how the smallholder livestock farmers perceive its influence towards the resilience of agricultural drought (Transparency International 2014). When there is a lack of data to do a detailed analysis of natural hazards such as agricultural drought, a perception index score becomes very important for such analyses (Dwyer et al. 2004). Bahta et al. (2016) applied the perception index for communal farmer's perception of drought in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. The role of government and social networks perceived by smallholder livestock farmers' to build agricultural drought resilience was of binary nature of the response and a respondent's choice lies on 'agree' and 'disagree' (with the statements indicated in Appendix 1 ), with numbers of respondents and the 'agreed' respondents assigned a positive value (+1) and 'disagree' respondent assigned a negative value ( − 1). A perception index score expressed as the mean score:

The closer the mean score was to +1, the greater the positive perception, and the closer the mean score was to − 1, the greater the negative perception. Udmale et al. (2014) and Bahta et al. (2016) highlighted that in mixed farming variables considered to analyses perception of farmers to agricultural droughts such as the role of gender, socio-economic activities, drought adaption, drought mitigation measure, psychological stress, level of drought risk to farmers farming operation, security and safety threats on their farm and other indicators. The indicator variables included in this study were the role of government and social networks. In this study, the selection of variables involved deductive approaches (Adger et al. 2004). The deductive approaches deal with theoretical relationships and the suitability of assigning values and weights. The variables selected were based on relevance, availability and ease of understanding and collecting information. The variables selected were not solely based on literature but also on the experience of the researchers in the study area.

Results and discussion

Socio-economic characteristics of smallholder livestock farmers

A summary of the socio-economic characteristics of the respondents is shown ( Table 1 ). The average age of the respondents was 55 years (median 56 years). This finding aligned with that of Badenhorst (2014) who found that the majority of farmers were not young. This implied that the younger generation did not consider agriculture as a profession. The highest proportions of the respondents were married (67%), single (20%), widowed (11%) or divorced (2%). Most (97%) of the respondents had one to five members in their household, and most were men (81%). This could have implied that a gender stereotype still existed in farming from the sampled respondents. Almost half (48%) of the respondents had attended high school, and 5% and 4%, respectively, possessed a diploma and degree. To develop a household's agricultural drought resilience, education plays an important role. The average farming experience was 12 years. Respondents farmed with sheep (25%), goats (30%) and cattle (45%).

Respondents' perceptions on level of drought vulnerability

Almost two-thirds (64.25%) of respondents perceived that their farming operations were very highly vulnerable to agricultural drought, 16.43% highly vulnerable and 13.53% moderately vulnerable. Finally, yet importantly, 1.93% and 3.86% of respondents perceived themselves as having zero and low vulnerability to agricultural drought, respectively. Amir Faisal, Polthanee and Promkhambut (2014) highlighted that farmers are aware of the intensity and the nature of recurrent drought. The experience and the severity of drought ranged from 2 to 5 years on respondents' farms. The most severe years of drought which respondents prioritised were 2015-2016, 2016-2017; 1982-1983, 1992-1993, 2009-2010 and 2012-2013.

Respondents' perceptions on the role of social networks

Social networks play an essential role in agricultural drought resilience. Many aspects that positively correlate with social networks include the human ability to absorb, buffer and initiate social innovations, to act collectively and the capacity to change and adapt strategies (Adger 2003; Matin et al. 2015; Moore & Westley 2011; Newman & Dale 2005; Tobin et al. 2014). Social networks can be either informal (e.g. neighbourhood groups, extended family networks, burial societies, women's groups and church groups) or formal (e.g. drought mitigation clubs, cooperatives and farmers' associations) (Bahta et al. 2016; Wongbusarakum & Loper 2011).

Respondents' perceptions of the role of social networks in enhancing resilience are presented ( Table 2 ). Social networks are divided into six indicators. Firstly, coordination and included institutions (e.g. farmers' organisations, cooperatives, Non-Governmental Organisations [NGOs], church clubs and family networks) that had the ability to coordinate activities of agricultural drought resilience. Secondly, collaboration, including the community's ability to collaborate with existing institutions and groups in enhancing agricultural drought resilience. Thirdly, involvement, namely the efforts made by the communities in enhancing resilience. Fourthly, cooperatives, which represented an association established to help with resources to cope with agricultural drought or resilience. Fifthly, relatives, which entailed family members helping during recurrent drought to reduce the burden of the shock. Sixthly, neighbours who included the people who lived around the farm and assisted with tending livestock.

The perception index for the social networks is − 0.54 ( Table 2 ). The respondents do not consider social networks efficient in enhancing resilience towards agricultural drought. The respondents' strongest negative perception ( − 0.81) is for coordination. Even though negative, community involvement in resilience activities is the strongest aspect of other social network indicators. About 9.66% of the respondents perceived coordination as a positive indicator ( Table 3 ); this could have been because of the absence of effective and efficient farmers' associations. Only 28.5% of the respondents felt that they are involved in agricultural drought resilience. It is inferred that social networks (23.27%) did not play an important role in enhancing agricultural drought resilience. However, literature shows that social networks are very important in the reduction of social vulnerability (Kuhlicke et al. 2011; Muyambo, Jordaan & Bahta 2017).

Respondents' perception on the role of government

A solid and functional institution is significant for enhancing agricultural drought resilience by disseminating information and policies to the public to ensure proper preparedness and planning (Vincent 2004). Table 3 presents respondents' perceptions of the government's role in enhancing resilience, and six indicators were used. Firstly, previous help, the government's past participation in agricultural drought resilience. Secondly, government assistance in supplying resources needed to build resilience (e.g. finances for farm input and fodder). Thirdly, government interest in agricultural drought resilience issues. Fourthly, government training, where the government participated in the training, dissemination of information and livestock management. Fifthly, government policies with the dissemination of national or regional drought policies. Sixthly, government farming practice with support to improve.

A positive perception index of 0.013 ( Table 3 ) implied that respondents perceived that the government-supported them to build their resilience; however, respondents indicated that the government needed to do more to support them. They elaborated that support from the government was often not on time and not good enough to enhance respondents' productivity to full capacity and enhance their resilience towards agricultural drought. As indicated ( Table 3 ), 140 (67.63%) respondents received assistance from the government in the form of farm input, finance and food. Most (62.63%) respondents claimed that they received assistance from the government for farm input, including fodder, 1% received financial assistance and the rest (4%) received food assistance during agricultural drought. Jordaan (2011) emphasised that in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa, there was inadequate drought support, late delivery of drought support and institutions incapable of service delivery.

Half (50.72%) of the respondents explained that the government provided training related to livestock management. Less (42.03%) respondents gained access to information related to policies on agricultural drought resilience. This was confirmed by an extension officer, who stated that they did not train or provide information about agricultural drought resilience and vulnerability.

Comparison of indicator variables

The average perception index score on the role of the social networks was 23.27%, whilst that of the role of government was 50.72%. This result implied that respondents perceived that government and social networks impacted building resilience towards agricultural drought. The percentage proportion of respondents' perception of the role of social networks had a lower impact in building resilience than the role of government. Overall, the average perception index of the role of social networks and government was -0.26 (-0.54+0.013/2) ( Table 2 and Table 3 ), indicating that their role in enhancing resilience towards agricultural drought was insufficient. Opiyo, Wasonga and Nyangito (2014) highlighted that social networks, social support and government support strengthen the resilience of households and farmers.

Correlation analysis of indicator variables

Perception of respondents on the role of the social networks indicator's involvement was positive and significantly correlated with collaboration at 1%, respectively ( Table 4 and Table 5 ). Engagement in cooperatives was positive and significantly correlated with collaboration and involvement at 1% level. This implied that the more farmers are engaging with cooperatives, the more reducing the burden of agricultural drought.

Assistance from neighbours was positive and significantly correlated with collaboration, involvement and cooperatives at 1% level ( Table 4 and Table 5 ). This implies that communication and interaction between respondents and institutions should be improved in order to enhance the resilience of respondents.

Respondents' perceptions on the role of government are presented ( Table 4 and Table 5 ). Most indicator variables under government role in enhancing agricultural drought resilience were significantly correlated with each other at 1% levels and positive. For example, government assistance, which provided resources to farmers to enhance resilience in the form of finance, farm inputs and fodder, was positive and significantly correlated with the government's previous involvement in agricultural drought resilience. This implied that the government's participation in the dissemination of information including policies, training related to agricultural drought resilience and access to resources including funding should be increased through vigorous means such as extensive extension officer, easily accessed notice boards, popular media (local magazines) and aggressive media involvement, which are accessible to smallholder livestock farmers.

Correlation analysis between social network and the government

To assess the correlation between social networks and government indicators, the principal component analysis is utilised by generating a single component or index of government and social networks, and then, tested the correlation between the government and social network indicators.

The correlation between social networks and government established almost all of them at 1% level significant ( Table 6 ). Social network variable coordination was positive and significantly correlated with government variable indicators of government past help, government interest, government policies and government farming practice at 1%, respectively ( Table 6 ). This implies that to achieve the government involvement, such as involvement in agricultural drought resilience in the past, government interest in agricultural drought resilience and impacts in the community, government dissemination of national or regional drought resilience policies and government supplying of resources to cope with agricultural drought, coordination of different stakeholder is necessary.

A social network variable collaboration was positive and significantly correlated with government variable indicators of government interest, government training and government policies at 1%, respectively. This implies that collaboration, including the community's ability to collaborate with existing institutions and groups in enhancing agricultural drought resilience, needed to government interest in agricultural drought resilience and impacts in the community, government trains the community and government dissemination of national or regional drought resilience policies required.

A positive and significant correlation between social network variable, involvement and government variable government interest, government training and government policies exists at 1%, respectively.

Conclusion and recommendation

Climatic variability is an unavoidable phenomenon. These uncertainties affect smallholder farmers' livelihoods when they lose their herds and capital. The study's main aim was to assess the perception of smallholder livestock farmers towards agricultural drought resilience and gain an understanding of the role of social networks and government on building resilience towards agricultural drought.

The study found that the average perception index of social networks and government to enhance agricultural drought resilience was negative. This implied that their role in enhancing resilience towards agricultural drought was insufficient. However, the proportion of respondents' perception of the role of social networks was lower than that of government. This indicated that respondents did not consider social networks efficient in enhancing resilience towards drought. With regard to the role of the social networks, the strongest negative perception was for coordination. Even though community involvement was negative, it was the strongest aspect compared to other social network indicators. Thus, social networks did not play a significant role in enhancing agricultural drought resilience. This could be, the information smallholder livestock farmers have about the social network is not good enough. Hence, smallholder livestock farmers' awareness of the significance of social networking and government participation should be promoted. All respondents perceived that they were either highly vulnerable or moderately vulnerable to drought, which indicated that they were aware of the intensity and the recurrent nature of agricultural drought.

There are implications in finding that the current social networking groups are not operating efficiently towards building the resilience of respondents. Hence, to build resilience, there should be coordination and cooperation amongst all role players to reinforce policies and strategies to build the resilience of smallholder livestock farmers. This includes coordinator amongst the local provincial government, African Farmers' Association of South Africa, extension officers, private sectors, monitoring agencies in terms of reliable early warning information and communication amongst decision-makers. Collaboration amongst government departments at the national and provincial levels should be strengthening to enhance farmer's resilience. The collaboration includes the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries at the national level, Provincial Departments of Agriculture, National and Provincial Disaster Management Centres, South African Weather Service and Department of Water Affairs. Their awareness of the importance of social networks and government participation could be enhanced. In particular, the government and the Northern Cape Province should improve access to information, access to training related to agricultural drought resilience, affordability of veterinary service, financing, irrigation and land and strengthening investment in a fodder bank.

Acknowledgements

The author acknowledges the contributions of Ringetani, Matlou, Zimbini Coka, Ntsako Maluleke and Lindie von Malitiz. The author also acknowledges and thanks the National Research Foundation (NRF), Thuthuka funding instrument for funding the project 'Household resilience to agricultural drought in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa' Contract Number/Project Number: TTK170510230380.

Competing interests

Y.T.B. declared that no competing interest exists.

Author's contributions

Y.T.B. declares that he is the sole author of this research article.

Ethical considerations

Ethical clearance was obtained from the University of the Free State Research Ethics Committee, with reference number: UFS-HSD2018/0597.

Funding information

This article is part of the project 'Household resilience to agricultural drought in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa' Contract Number / Project Number (TTK170510230380) received fund from National Research Foundation (NRF), Thuthuka funding instrument for funding.

Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, Y.T.B., upon reasonable request.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any affiliated agency of the author.

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Received: 13 May 2020 Accepted: 14 May 2021 Published: 22 June 2021

1 . Resilience is about having the capacity to sustain in the face of shocks and change by buffering shocks, adapting and transforming in response to change (in this study agricultural drought) (Folke 2016). 2 . Agricultural drought is a decline in water availability (precipitation) below the optimal level required (IPCC 2012). 3 . Smallholder farmers are those farmers in transition between subsistence and commercial farming.

Dimensions of drought: South African case studies

• Published: May 1993
• Volume 30 , pages 93–98, ( 1993 )

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• Vogel C. H. 1 &
• Drummond J. H. 2  

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The recent drought in southern Africa has underscored the need for detailed analysis of the phenomenon. While geographers have researched the causes and impacts of drought in many African contexts, South Africa and in particular its Bantustans have not received sufficient similar attention. This paper outlines firstly the dimensions of drought in South Africa, including the biophysical and socio-economic factors. Issues such as land-use management, drought planning and relief are interrogated in the South African context. The final section of the paper highlights these debates with specific reference to case studies of past and present drought initiatives in South Africa.

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Vogel C. H.

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Vogel, C.H., Drummond, J.H. Dimensions of drought: South African case studies. GeoJournal 30 , 93–98 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00807832

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Issue Date : May 1993

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00807832

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