Mozambique: Nampula dam almost empty

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Mozambique: Nampula dam almost empty

1:35 CAT | 08 Jan 2025

FILE - For illustration purposes only. The Águas da Região do Norte (AdRN) utility has been instructed to supply only 10 cubic metres of water per day until the situation is regularized [File photo: Wamphula Fax]

The dam that supplies water to the city of Nampula is partially dry, with only 20% of its storage capacity, the Regional Water Administration of the North (ARA-Norte) told Wamphula Fax on Tuesday.

Nampula city residents are being hit with increasingly aggressive water supply restrictions, with some city areas having had no water in the taps for more than two weeks.

But ARA-Norte provincial director Carlitos Omar warns that the restrictions on the water supply will continue.

“We have instructed Águas da Região do Norte (AdRN) to distribute only 10 cubic metres of water per day until the situation is regularized,” Omar stressed.

According to him, the rains that fell during tropical cyclone Chido were not enough to increase the reservoir levels.

Many middle- and high-income citizens have therefore resorted to buying water from private suppliers, who are now charging 1,000 meticais for every thousand cubic meters supplied from tanker trucks to clients’ reservoir tanks.

Poorer people, by contrast, must resort to wells and puddles, whose water is often unfit for human consumption.

In December of last year, ARA-Norte announced an investment, with support from the World Bank, of USA$150 million in the construction of a new dam. According to projections, the infrastructure will have a capacity 16 times greater than that currently supplying water to the city.

When asked about the current status of the project, Omar said only that it could start soon.

To minimize the current water crisis, ARA-Norte reported last month that it had reactivated 50 water sources and distribution points installed at the time of the Covid-19 outbreak.

Source: Wamphula Fax