As the water year progresses and with the winter cropping season in full swing, the Zimbabwe National Water Authority continues to call upon all raw water users without water abstraction agreements to come forward and sign these in order to legalise their water use. Having water agreements is not only an administrative requirement but a legal one as well.It is therefore critical that all raw water users should ensure that their water use is legalised and avoid the inconveniences associated with water disconnections at farms and other institutions and where necessary prosecution for the violation of the Water Act.
Raw water users are reminded that anyone using water for purposes other than primary purposes need to have water abstraction agreements or surface water permits.
All those raw water users using water from ZINWA managed dams are required, in terms of Statutory Instrument 206 of 2001 to enter into a water abstraction agreement with ZINWA.
For the avoidance of doubt the Statutory Instrument states that “No surface water permit shall be required of a person who wishes to abstract surface water from a water storage works or share of a water storage works vested in the State of the National Water Authority for any purpose mentioned in paragraph (a), but such person must enter into an abstraction agreement with the National Water Authority in terms of subsection (6) of section 39 of the Act.”
The water abstraction agreements give the holder an exclusive right to a portion of water in the dam for his use.
These agreements aid ZINWA in planning the water resources available for any given area and the importance of agreements cannot be overemphasised especially during a water year such as this one which is characterised by water stress owing to the El Nino induced drought which the country is experiencing.
Farmers without agreements risk losing their crops as no water will be reserved for them while those found to be on the wrong side of the law will be prosecuted and risk being fined twice the advantage or profit they would have derived from their illegal use of water.
However, as people apply for agreements, it is very paramount that they clearly understand their water needs since it would be very difficult to have their agreements revised late in the water year when they realise that they would not be requiring part of the portion of the water reserved for them. At the end of the day, the users would still be required to pay for their whole allocation.
Also important for these agreement holders is for them to have metres or other acceptable measuring devices at their points of abstraction.
This will help them to know the amount of water released to them at any given moment and help them appreciate their bills at the end of the day.
Over the years, farmers without measuring devices have found it very difficult to accept their bills when the water would have been actually released to them.
Apart from helping them appreciate their water consumption patterns, the Water Act makes it compulsory for any agreement holder or any surface water permit holder to install at his own cost, a metre or other acceptable measuring device.
Section 43 (1) (a) of the Water Act compels water users to “provide and install a meter or other measuring device for measuring and recording the amount of water abstracted” while ZINWA or other authorised officers are empowered to inspect the meter or measuring device, take readings from it and ensure that the meter or measuring device is not interfered with.
The agreement holder is also required to keep and maintain a proper record of the abstractions and also submit returns.
Most of the time, raw water users have ignored this very important legal requirement resulting in disputes with ZINWA when their bills are presented to them.
It is therefore against this background that ZINWA continues to appeal to all raw water users to ensure that they have water abstraction agreements and also install measuring devices at their points of abstraction.
For more information please contact the ZINWA Corporate Communications and Marketing Department on [email protected] or visit www.zinwa.co.zw. You can also like the Zimbabwe National Water Authority Facebook Page or contact our call centre on 0867 700 4339, (04) 850 066 and (04) 850 261.