The Hunger Games III: Round 2 Team Limitations (and Conclusion)💨

Ding ding ding...in Round 2 we have Team Limitations; will they live up to the hype or get crushed!

Introduction:

Hopefully from the previous post you have an understanding of the successes of Windhoek. To start off this post I wanted to highlight something very important to reaching a fair conclusion for this topic, having done a plethora of reading surrounding this topic it has become very clear that there are wide ranging opinions about the success of MAR in Windhoek. It has become apparent there seems to be quite a distinct disconnect between the narrative of articles from Western media and those that have been written by authors/academics local to Namibia.

For reference, Western articles such as from the Guardian paint the picture of "crops are failing and livestock is dying" and "Namibia's worst for 30 years". To make a comparison, a lot of
local articles are relatively outdated so I took it upon myself to actually email Dr Ricky Murray (the author of a lot of the MAR literature) myself, he did actually reply so I thought I would include this exchange (Figure 1) to highlight the reality of this disparity:

  

Figure 1: Dr Ricky Murray's reply to my email asking about Windhoek.

Challenges and Limitations:

1. Financial Barriers

The largest burden ensuring Windhoek's water security is the financial backing required for it to be successful. Supposedly an "urgent investment of $1.58bn is needed from the state to secure Windhoek’s water supply", this is over 10% of the entire of Namibia's GDP, which under an economic lens is extremely unrealistic to happen. This number appears to be massively inflated however, Murray's journal claims "The City of Windhoek has already spent over US$8.4 million on the scheme, and is looking to fund an additional US$ 9.6 million of the required US$52.4 million – the balance they will have to source externally." This doesn't take away from the picture that there is still a significant financial barrier for Windhoek to overcome to continue the MAR success.

2. Maintaining Water Quality

It is all good having a successful MAR system that provides enough water but if the water isn't of good enough quality and the population don't want to drink/use it for food due to e.g. E-coli contamination it you could argue the scheme wasn't a success. There is evidence to suggest that water quality has improved however "water quality in Namibia is still lacking in rural areas", also highlighted in Figure 2.

                                     Figure 2: Windhoek's Water Crisis Video

Conclusion:

Linking back to the big picture of food; the MAR programme is clearly a ground-breaking project that has established a good standard for sustainable water management and hence has improved food security as a result. However, given the technological and socioeconomic difficulties involved, its replication in other arid environments needs to be done carefully. 

MAR's encouraging performance acts as a reminder that large projects like this need for careful, continuous review and adjustment. It is evident that the MAR plan is a complex interaction of creativity, environmental care, and community engagement rather than just a technical fix.

The Hunger Games II: Round 1 Team Success💦

Ding ding ding... in the first corner we have Team Success; will they win the hunger games or will they be left in the dust like the other tributes?

Welcome Back:

Hopefully you all have a good understanding of Namibia's MAR scheme from previous posts. I have decided to make this post as a follow up to evaluate! Whilst I am planning to look under this project with a critical lens (again referring back to my action plan) I will try my best to not make generalisations. 

Successes:

The MAR initiative has unquestionably improved Windhoek's water and hence food security, however we need to take this one step further as Geographers to try and understand to what extent it has actually improved. Their approach to water management has not only maintained a consistent supply of water but also reduced dependency on outside water sources (Taylor, 2019), which is a significant step in the right direction for a 'desert' city (Tredoux, Van Der Merwe and Peters, 2009). 

Through prudent water storage during times of surplus, the city has protected itself against the unpredictability of its arid environment (this can only be verified by a time of drought/hardship). During the 2015/2016 drought "borehole water provided the city’s water security...because the aquifer had been replenished via borehole injection prior to the drought" (Murray, 2017), this a clear example of success for the MAR project in a practical context, critics argue if it weren't for the boreholes due to the lack of other water retainment strategies Windhoek would have struggled through this period of drought. To link this back to the big picture of food, decreased water availability means less water to grow crops with and hence decreased food security. Empirical data is also undeniable proof, Figure 1 shows after 2005 when the boreholes were drilled the water level of the Micaceous quartzites returned back to pre-1950 extraction levels.

Figure 1: Water Level overtime in Aquifers (UNESCO, 2021)

Figure 2 also highlights this:

Figure 2: "Total aquifer abstraction, injection, rainfall and average water level from all boreholes" (Murray et al., 2018)

In addition, it is also important to highlight the other successes as a biproduct of MAR. For example, there are evident economic impacts of an improved water supply (Mapani, Shikangalah and Mwetulundila, 2023). Having a reliable water source means that they can develop their agricultural and tourism sectors which ultimately contributes to the economy in a secular manner.

Main Points and Overview:

• MAR has clear successes for water/food security.
• It has other benefits outside of just water/food security (e.g. economic).
• It can be statistically proven to be successful, suggesting it's transferable to other regions.

Initially, I was going to weigh up the successes and limitations of Windhoek's MAR scheme into one post however I underestimated how much literature and reading there was surrounding this topic. Hence I have decided to now dedicate one post to successes and one on limitations (and a conclusion/comparison!)

I hope this will paint a much more detailed picture of the true story of water security in Windhoek.

As always thanks for reading and I encourage you to comment below with any thoughts or feedback!