What Are the Causes of Water Pollution in South Africa?
Human activity is a major contributor to water contamination in South Africa. It cannot be denied.
The species that is polluting freshwater sources is the very species that is so reliant on safe and clean water. What, though, is water pollution? Water pollution, broadly speaking, is the process of foreign contaminants entering a body of water (either above or below ground), making the water unusable or harmful to the ecosystem in which it is located.
Water contamination has disastrous effects: In addition to vulnerable individuals and communities, plant and animal life also suffers. Make ensuring that all South Africans have access to clean, safe water by holding your government accountable.
South Africa’s water pollution effects
The UmBilo river ecosystem in KwaZulu Natal, South Africa, is under threat from water pollution. The river’s native plant and animal species are being wiped out, and the pollution is even changing the color of the water itself.
What forms of water pollution are there?
Waste plastics cause water pollution
Africa’s plastic pollution problem is a political one. Thousands of tons of plastic debris are transported annually from the Global North into nations like South Africa and Kenya, where the majority of it ends up in delicate river and dam ecosystems, causing water contamination. Water contamination is also a hazard to Africa’s beaches. The South African government is having trouble stopping the dumping of plastic garbage in the Indian Ocean, which is a problem made worse by the massive amounts of plastic-polluted water that enter the ocean through rivers and tributaries overflowing with plastic bottles and other single-use plastic products. Marine life is most severely impacted by plastic-induced water pollution. Many marine species ingest microplastics and suffocate to death after mistaking them for food.
Mining’s impact on the environment
Hydraulic fracturing, sometimes known as fracking, is a mining procedure that requires a lot of water and is one of the main contributors to water contamination. To liberate naturally occurring oil and gas for energy, water contaminated with chemical contaminants, sand, and other materials is pumped under high pressure into deep underground wells. This sewage is kept in tanks where it frequently seeps into groundwater, contaminating it and rendering it unsafe for consumption by humans. In some cases, the contaminated water is just drilled deeper into the rock, where it causes more damage.
Farming’s contribution to water contamination
In emerging nations, large-scale agrochemical-intensive farming seriously pollutes the water supply. Farmers are under pressure to produce crops more quickly and are straying from organic, sustainable agricultural methods as the need for food increases rapidly on a global scale. By introducing pesticides and excessive nitrogen from fertilizers into rivers, streams, and water tables, they are endangering their health and the health of their communities in the process. Evidence suggests that intensive dairy production, in particular, causes water contamination by discharging an excessive amount of nitrogen into water bodies and groundwater tables by the use of artificial, nitrogen-rich fertilizers. Overproduction of nitrogen-rich waste by farm animals that eat nitrogen-rich vegetation exacerbates the issue and leads to water contamination.
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Who is harming the water?
Eskom, the electrical company of South Africa
One of the primary factors contributing to the country’s water contamination is South Africa’s national electricity provider. There is no denying that enormous quantities of contaminated water are released into our environment during the extraction and washing of coal for electricity production as well as during the cooling of steam turbines. This contaminated water has disastrous effects on communities at risk. Acid mine drainage exacerbates water pollution from coal mining, which severely pollutes important South African water bodies
What to do
African water bodies, like the Olifants River, are close to the ecologically delicate Kruger National Park.
You currently hold the ability to stop water contamination.
Every man, woman, and child in Africa is entitled to the fundamental human right to access clean, fresh, uncontaminated water that has not been contaminated by plastic, oil, mining, pesticides, fertilizers, waste products, or other contaminants that harm weaker communities and harm significant and irreplaceable ecosystems.
