Mozambique: Water restrictions to worsen in Nampula – AIM report

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Mozambique: Water restrictions to worsen in Nampula – AIM report

8:39 CAT | 20 Oct 2022

Image: Miramar

The government’s Water Supply Investment and Assets Fund (FIPAG) will in a few days further reduce the volume supplied to the northern town of Nampula from the current 33,000 to 30,000 cubic metres per day.

The move seeks to ensure supply of water, stored in the dam on the Monapo river, until the rainfall, which is expected to occur between January and February next year.

According to the director of FIPAG, Nampula city operational area, Mateus Saeze, this is the best solution available in the short term for managing the system.

Saeze, who was speaking to reporters on Tuesday (18), after a visit to the dam, explained that there are around 900,000 inhabitants in the town of Nampula up from 120,000 when the dam was built six decades ago.

Thus, according to the source, Nampula needs at least 120,000 cubic metres per day to fully satisfy the demand of the residents, which is a long way from its current maximum production of 40,000 cubic metres.

“We have already started with the restrictions, even to manage what we have until the beginning of the rainy season. Now, we are pumping 33,000 cubic metres per day but in the next two weeks we will have to cut it down to 30,000” he explained.

He also noted that there is the Namiteca borehole field, (on the outskirts of the city) with eight of the ten boreholes operational and that could help to increase water supply, while two are inoperable “because their salinity levels are well above what is admissible by the health authorities.”

Saeze said that even when production reaches its full level, 40,000 cubic metres per day, the supply follows a rotational scheme in the town’s neighbourhoods.

“For what is the current population of Nampula town, we would need 120,000 cubic metres per day. Currently, when the dam is at its maximum level, we can only supply 40,000 cubic meters, so there’s a deficit of 80,000 cubic meters,” he said.

Saeze lamented that people acting in bad faith continue to vandalise FIPAG’s infrastructures, particularly the water distribution network, and called for vigilance and a sense of responsibility in the conservation of the common assets and infrastructures.

According to FIPAG, permanent solution to the city’s water supply problem depends on the construction of the Mugica dam on the Monapo river, about 110 kilometres north of the city.

Source: AIM