AN OVERVIEW OF INDIGENOUS, INDIGENISED AND CONTEMPORARY WATER HARVESTING AND CONSERVATION PRACTICES IN SOUTH AFRICA

A scoping study has found that there are at least 15 water harvesting and conservation methods in use across South Africa, with minor variations and combinations also evident. Some of these are indigenous in that they were developed locally, others are indigenised, meaning they are hybrid solutions incorporating external influences, and finally, there are contemporary practices introduced more recently by scientists or development agencies. The techniques that were identified covered a wide range of scales in differing socio-economic and agricultural contexts, such as the tens of thousands of hectares of commercially oriented floodwater harvesting in the Northern Cape, called the saaidam (literally planting-dam), to micro-terracing in Mpumalanga. Our review concluded that while there are some indigenous water harvesting and conservation (WHC) practices, these are notably few compared with other places in the world. This is explained by historical settlement patterns in the wetter part of South Africa, with low land pressure, and an indigenous culture which placed more emphasis on pastoral than cropping practices. Indigenous and indigenised practices, which are locally well adapted, have inherent sustainability and present an opportunistic platform from which to inform new interventions in support of improved agricultural production. Copyright (C) 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.