Azra Hoosen | ah@radioislam.co.za
19 March 2024 | 13:00 CAT
2 min read

As the world marks World Water Day under the theme “Water for Peace,” Dr. Anthony Turton underscores the critical link between water access, conflict, and environmental management.

In his recent opinion piece, Turton emphasised how unequal access to water resources can exacerbate tensions and hinder peace-building efforts. He also illuminated the shortcomings within the water sector and rapid environmental changes and stressed the necessity for comprehensive analysis to tackle water-related conflicts.

In an interview with Radio Islam, Dr Anthony Turton, a Water expert from the University of the Free State (UFS) Centre for Environmental Management, highlighted the extensive work done in the transboundary water community, of which he is a member.

“It is unlikely that countries are going to go to war over water; however, where water is unevenly distributed in society, you tend to get it to amplify underlying tensions, which is what we are seeing in different parts of the world. As the water problems are playing up in South Africa now, we see this playing out without a doubt,” he said.

Turton believes that in the near future, the uneven distribution of water or, more importantly, disruptions of water supply will amplify underlying tensions in society.

“We found, for example, that in the northern parts of SA, we have over 4000 units of water per unit, and we are seeing parts of SA becoming like that. If you use that as a metric, then you see that the Middle East, North Africa and parts of India, Pakistan and Southeast Asia are all extremely densely populated, so these are the areas where we see this kind of problem playing out but also in the USA, by the Colorado River, it just manifests more in some areas,” he said.

According to Turton, the key drivers in this context are the rate of change in any system from one status to another and the capacity of the institutions in society to cope with that change. “We have found, particularly in South Africa, that the rate of change is so fast that the institutional capacity to copy is simply not there, and this is what is playing out with Rand Water and the Vaal,” he said.

Turton asserts that we need to build resilience in our institutions and deepen their technical capacity.

He highlighted that desalination is very much part and parcel of the future and has a big role to play. He pointed out that the desalination debate is being driven from the Middle East, where Saudi Arabia is actually trying to drive the cost of desalination down from the global benchmark price to 25 US cents per cubic meter, which is way cheaper than what we are currently paying for water in South Africa.

Turton emphasises that Cape Town is the leading municipality in this area. Following their water crisis in 2018/2019, they have implemented an advanced water security plan that includes constructing a utility-scale desalination plant rather than a costly small-scale plant.

As water pollution worsens, the challenge of treating it to safe standards intensifies, leading to higher treatment costs. Dr. Turton predicts a widespread adoption of large-scale desalination in many coastal cities to address this issue. He suggests that this shift could bolster investor confidence, stabilize economies, and decouple cities from the drought cycle, offering a sustainable solution to water scarcity.

LISTEN to the full interview with Ml Junaid Kharsany and water expert, Dr Anthony Turton, here.