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Water authorities in Johannesburg have been warned they are facing a full-blown crisis.

The collapse of the city’s water and sanitation grid appears to be imminent thanks to a lack of funds available to maintain and replace the ever-ageing infrastructure.

The Johannesburg Water’s business plan, which covers the 2023/24 financial year, revealed the truly sorry state of Jozi’s water and sanitation infrastructure, reported News24.

The dossier lays bare how Johannesburg Water, the City of Johannesburg’s water company, has a water and sanitation infrastructure backlog totalling a staggering R24 billion.

“Johannesburg Water’s infrastructure portfolio of R115 billion lost 59% of its value, which equates to R68 billion.

“This is indicative of the R24 billion backlog of assets which have reached the end of their useful lifespan. This trend will continue because of insufficient funding, which will result in increased infrastructure failure, financial losses and dissatisfied consumers.

“Network backlogs have increased significantly, posing a serious risk to development and economic objectives,” the report said.

Authorities’ inability to meet the mandated annual infrastructure renewal rate of 2% directly led to the staggering 59% depreciation in the company’s asset value. This failure underscores the importance of timely asset replacement to ensure infrastructure remains viable throughout its expected lifespan.

According to the report, Johannesburg Water should ideally set aside around R1.09 billion each year for pipe replacements and about R941 million for sewer pipe upgrades to hit the 1.5% asset renewal target. But over the past decade, budget constraints have kept the company from hitting that mark.

“The current expenditure pattern indicates that an average renewal rate of 1% has been achieved with current funding allocations.

“The company has an infrastructure renewal backlog of R24 billion as a result of underfunding, which has also led to 25% of the asset base having a remaining useful life of less than 10 years,” says the dossier.

Now, water authorities are getting anxious because tight funding is slowing down the process of clearing this backlog, which means the city’s infrastructure will just keep getting older.

Water authorities are urgently sounding the alarm, saying that hefty backlogs in water and infrastructure due to budget constraints are holding back economic growth and development in South Africa’s financial hub and across the continent. Without funds to upgrade the water and sanitation systems, not only will infrastructure suffer, but businesses and customers could also face significant financial setbacks, warn water officials and economists.

Econometrix chief economist Azar Jammine said Johannesburg Water’s status was a result of mismanagement by the City of Johannesburg and the diversion of resources to areas of spending that provided no benefit at the expense of renewing infrastructure. He may or may not be referring to their personal pockets.

Jammine said the country needs to start paying attention to the unfolding water crises:

“We have become so used to focusing on Eskom and logistics, and forgot about water, which could be more serious than electricity and Transnet. Without water, life stops.

“You can’t have a situation where you don’t have water in the country’s economic heartland. If you don’t have water, you will not be able to produce goods and services,” Jammine said.

Indeed, with some interruptions in the water supply across the country already, we can all agree that having no water for a day is far more dire and difficult than having no electricity.

Population growth all around doesn’t help the issue either. 

National Treasury might have to step in and bail out Johannesburg Water, Jammine said.

In a surprising revelation, the report found that Johannesburg Water is short a whopping R64 billion needed for infrastructure replacement over the next decade. Shockingly, the company has only set aside a meagre R7.3 billion for infrastructure renewal in the next five years.

Water Community Action Network executive manager Ferrial Adam said the city could do better to capitalise on Johannesburg Water, noting that they’re wildly misspending:

“The City of Johannesburg makes about R12 billion out of water sales every year, but they give Johannesburg Water only R1 billion for infrastructure maintenance. They should ring-fence money to replace infrastructure at Johannesburg Water. They are spending money on the wrong things.”

“How is it that they don’t have money for infrastructure but they have money for bodyguards for the mayor and a host of other people?” Adam asked.

Already the region is experiencing devastating water shortages that have lasted weeks on end. The situation will probably continue under pressure or, at worst, it will fail and collapse.

[source:news24]