Waiting for the wastewater management crisis

The perceived abundance of water resources in many countries in Africa means less effort is made to treat and reuse wastewater.

Nevertheless, the African adage, water-water everywhere but none to drink, is true on a continent where millions of cubic metres of water is wasted every year while almost half the population lack access to clean and safe drinking water.

“Wastewater management is not yet an emergency for us here in Nigeria due to the abundance of freshwater in the country, unlike other countries,” says Benson Ajisegiri, the water supply director in Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Water Resources.

While African countries wait for nature to recycle wastewater for them, most countries are already experiencing scarcity while in others water resources are under intense pressure from population growth and urbanisation, rapid industrialisation, and intensifying food production.

There may be many reasons for Africa’s current water situation, but one could be the absence of strategies to ensure that wastewater is turned into purposeful use. Reliance on natural systems for the treatment of wastewater is inadequate. This includes natural wetlands that are used for purifying large volumes of wastewater before it ends up in streams, lagoons, or the ocean.

According to a 2014 World Bank report, the world’s total urban population reached an estimated 3.8 billion in 2013, and is projected to swell to nearly 6.3 billion in 2050, with an average growth of four per cent per annum in Sub-Saharan Africa (compared to an average of one per cent in North America, Europe and Central Asia). This urban population growth rate, without commensurate development in water management systems, poses a threat to human health and wellbeing and has immediate and long-term consequences.

About 1.8 million people die every year from diarrhoeal diseases (including cholera). Ninety per cent are children under five, mostly in developing countries. An estimated 88 per cent of diarrhoeal diseases are attributed to unsafe water supply, inadequate sanitation and hygiene.

A report by Green Facts, an NGO, notes the amount of wastewater produced will keep increasing, while the infrastructure and management systems for water will remain inadequate.

Several African countries including Zambia, Uganda, and Kenya have put in place wastewater treatment systems which include on-site, off-site, and conventional treatment methods. Such facilities are largely non-existent in Nigeria, despite being the most populous country in Africa.

Nigeria also lacks a regulatory framework for wastewater management, which has led to situations where companies release their wastewater directly into water bodies such as rivers.

The Niger-Delta region of the country is a major site of oil development. Oil spills and exploration as well as industrial waste have made the fresh- and saltwater in the region uninhabitable for aquatic life forms such as fish, and unsafe for consumption by humans. This contributes to the wastewater crises in Nigeria and highlights the lack of adequate wastewater management systems.

In a recent interview, the water supply director in Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Water Resources, Benson Ajisegiri, revealed that there are no wastewater management laws in the country.

“The government has started thinking about ways of managing wastewater and this is captured in the 2017 water resources policy. The policy has some aspects devoted to issues of wastewater and if we implement it as contained in the policy, then it will be alright for the country”, according to Benson Ajisegiri.

He added that the government has agencies and departments that should supervise the effective discharge of wastewater but due to the absence of policy guidelines, those agencies are reluctant to ensure that wastewater is discharged appropriately.