by Amos Chanda – SANF 04 no 75
Zambia will not sign the Zambezi Watercourse Commission (ZAMCOM) agreement before the 16-17 August SADC Summit deadline it had given itself because government has not reached a consensus on the matter with the country’s various stakeholders.
At the launch of ZAMCOM on 13 July in Kasane, Botswana, seven other SADC countries that share the Zambezi Basin signed the agreement while Zambia requested time to consult further at national level.
“Zambia’s signature is not foreseeable just now. Negotiations with stakeholders are still going on. That is the current status,” said Geoffrey Mukala, permanent secretary in the ministry of Energy and Water Development.
“Zambia will not be able to sign because environmental groups and the private sector are still not agreed on ZAMCOM,” he said.
The commission — involving the riparian states of Angola, Botswana, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe — is designed to promote efficient management and sustainable development of the water and other natural resources in the Zambezi Basin.
The agreement is the culmination of negotiations that date back to the 1980s. But the intervening period up to 2002 when negotiations resumed was utilised to negotiate the SADC Protocol on Shared Watercourses, which was signed in 1995. It was revised and signed in 2000 by SADC.
Other parties say Zambia did not sign the ZAMCOM agreement because they want a greater say in the management of the Zambezi Basin because other countries have smaller portions falling in the basin and thus should not have equal leverage.
Up to 70.2 percent of Zambia’s population of 11 million live in the Zambezi Basin and most of the country’s electricity needs are met from hydropower stations that lie in the basin.
Environmental problems that originate from Zambia include water pollution from mining and domestic refuse, and the depletion of the wilderness value due to over-development of tourism.
The Environmental Council of Zambia (ECZ) fears that planned irrigation initiatives and increasing population may cause land degradation, soil erosion and possibly harm biodiversity.
On the Zimbabwean side, environmental concerns are similar to those from Zambia but include the threat of downstream impacts of sedimentation as a result of damming of basin tributaries. This could result in impaired ecosystems and loss of biodiversity.
This is also the case with Angola, Tanzania and Malawi where unsustainable damming is posing a threat to ecosystems. Increasing demand for firewood is also causing dangers of deforestation, which is fueling soil erosion.
In Mozambique, mining and sewer pollution, added to increasing settlements causing deforestation, are the major environmental problems in the basin. Mozambique is at the mess all environmental mistakes of upstream riparian states.
SADC sees the launch of ZAMCOM as a significant move towards regional integration in the region. The Zambezi river and its dense network of tributaries and associated ecosystems constitute one of southern Africa’s most important and valuable natural resources.
SADC leaders agree that since these resources are shared, sustainable management requires regional cooperation and an integrated ecosystem approach to achieve a balance between human demands on natural resources and the natural environment’s ability to meet these demands.
The Zambezi river drains an area of almost 1.4 million sq km, bigger in size than any of the SADC member states except the Democratic Republic of Congo, and some 40 million people inhabit its basin. It is the largest shared river basin wholly within the SADC region, encompassing about 25 percent of basin states. (SARDC)
