Catchment management through integrated water resource management and co-operative governance in a municipal area

Abstract

The Local Government: Municipal Demarcation Act, 27 of 1998 established new municipal areas according to, amongst other, geographical parameters such as interdependence of communities, grouped and connected logistical capacity, existing magisterial boundaries, land use patterns (e.g. topocadastral farm boundaries), political reasons (e.g. location of voters), and the topographical, environmental and physical characteristics of an area. Unfortunately, the geographical jurisdiction of the municipalities for the purpose of improving integrated municipal management (e.g. planning, organising and control) neither acknowledges nor utilises the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS)’s identifi ed and demarcated surface water (rivers) catchment boundaries. This could lead to ineffective, inefficient and uneconomical municipal environmental services, and water and sanitation management. By determining the status of the geographical, geo-hydrological and macroorganisational arrangements of the municipal service providers and public managers in various municipal areas through an extensive literature review and archival research since 2010, the author found the aforementioned prevalent in all the researched municipal areas. It was concluded that the use of surface water catchments in regional public planning and organising is essential to facilitate, amongst other, effective integrated water resources management and co-operative governance in the local sphere of government in a developing South Africa.