Africa is running out of water
Cities and towns across the continent are struggling with water shortages brought on by drought, population growth and insufficient investment in dams
Accra/Cape Town — As water supplies in Ghana’s capital grew increasingly erratic, Beatrice Kabuki stopped customers from using her grocery store’s bathrooms and installed a plastic storage tank at her home. “The taps flow once a week and usually at night, so we stay awake to fetch what we can store,” Kabuki, 35, said in an interview in Accra. “We mostly augment by buying water from tankers.” Cities and towns in several other African nations including Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Ivory Coast have been plagued by similar water shortages in recent months, manifestations of a global supply squeeze brought on by drought, population growth, urbanisation and insufficient investment in dams and other infrastructure. Water use has risen about 1% a year since the 1980s and more than 2-billion people now live in countries experiencing high water stress, the UN says in its World Water Development Report released in Geneva on Tuesday. It projects demand will grow as much as 30% by 2050. “Stress leve...
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