Pretoria - The Department of Water and Sanitation has started a process to validate and verify water users in the Olifants Water Management Area to ensure that all the available water is accounted for.
The process follows a request for the registration of water use in the Olifants Water Management Area, which was published under Notice 32 of the Government Gazette, Number 21 969 of 12 January 2001.
“The registration process required that all water use, regardless of the legal status, had to be registered. The only registration requirement was that it must be a use that existed, whether lawful or not,” the department said.
In terms of Section 3(b) of Regulation 1352 dated 12 November 1999, a person who uses water -- as contemplated in Section 21 of the National Water Act, 199 (Act 36 of 1998) -- must register the water use when called upon by the responsible authority to do so.
The department said the first step in the process is the validation of water use within the various water management areas. During the validation of water use, various sources of information will be used to determine the preliminary extent and lawfulness of such use and to identify unregistered water use.
“The purpose of validation is firstly to determine the extent of water use as it existed during the period 1996 to 1999. This is referred to as the “qualifying period” in terms of the National Water Act. Secondly, it is to determine the extent of the present water use and thirdly, the determination of the lawfulness of the uses. Water uses that will be validated are the taking of water, the storing of water and forestry – stream flow reduction activities.
“The validation of water use can be described as the internal and informal investigations undertaken by the department to determine the extent of water use,” the department said.
The validation of water use is necessary to identify unregistered water use and to check the correctness of registered use for the proper water resource management for the benefit of all. Verification will confirm the lawfulness of the water uses identified during the validation phase through formal legal administrative process.
In ensuring that the stakeholders understand the process and the country’s water management strategy, the department is currently engaging the relevant stakeholder sectors through information sessions.
The department will on 8 April 2016 engage with stakeholders in the Upper Olifants at the Nkangala District Municipality. – SAnews.gov.za
