South Africa - Integrated Water Harvesting Project in the Mpumalanga Province

The Integrated Water Harvesting Project (IWHP) was formulated by Ecolink, a local Non-Governmental Organization (NGO), in response to a direct request for help from local community groups in the target communities, to address the need for local water resources development and management for food production and poverty reduction. The project will address the vulnerability of beneficiary communities to the high variability of atmospheric and soil moisture, critical to their horticulture based livelihoods, through establishing the means and capacity for collecting and storing water for vegetable gardening during the wet season for use in the five dry months of the year. More importantly, based on its design, the project will foster social capital and empower the women’s and youths’ groups who are the primary target beneficiaries, as well as the larger community, to better address issues affecting local livelihoods, in particular in relation to water scarcity, climate change and food production. The components include training and capacity building involving individuals, groups and institutions; implementation of locally adapted technical infrastructure interventions for enhancing water security for small-scale productive activities, as well as a significant element of strategic learning and knowledge generation. The project shall be implemented over a period of 30 months.