YOU HOME IS NOT A SHOWCASE, IT’S A PRIVATE RESIDENCY!!!!!!

I got so upset one day when i passed by a house near my school one morning, as i was walking past i saw what was meant to be a beautiful decorative sprinkler feature in the garden of this house. The sprinklers in the garden of this house were all switched on both inside the yard and outside. I then continued to observe the yard and i noticed that they were not really on just to water the plants, the sprinklers were making some kind of artistic fountain- which by the way, had no audience. It was ridiculous I thought to myself. There are millions of people out there who do not even have a glass of water a day and here is this ‘oh so sophisticated residence that belongs to a rather careless character, wasting tons of water. I got even more emotional about the situation when I passed the same house later on that day when it was after school- and well, the sprinklers were still on. I highly doubt that anyone bothered to switch them off,between 7h00 and14h00, since it didn’t seem like there was anyone home. This kind of negligence is one that we really do not need at all, such people who take precious resources for granted need to realise the extent of their actions. Their actions will implicate us all sooner rather than later. I propose that water prices should increase, because it seems that the only way that people will start acting and doing the right thing, is if they feel the pinch in their pockets!

LET THE CHANGE BEGIN

In order for us to begin to apply the solutions that have been introduced to us as problem solvers to the water situation; we need to be aware of what solutions are out there for us. We already know from the many adverts on television, how to save water. The most effective ways to save water is to use less water when taking a bath or rather take a shower; you can also reuse bathing water to water the plants. The more recent and more innovative ways to save water is to use jojo tanks. These tanks collect rain water and you can reuse that water for other uses. Jojo tanks have been introduced to rural areas where they would usually collect water that has not been purified,from the river. Whenever it rained they would have more water and thus the water truck doesn’t have to come deliver water as much. you can also try a jojo tank 🙂

WHAT CAN BE DONE??

Many people come up with all sorts of solutions to the water situation. Solutions which seem excellent to them and a quick fix. One solution that a lot of people have been talking about for some time is, taking water from the ocean. Now if we really analyse the situation carefully, we can find many problems that could result from this. The reason why this kind of solution has not been put in place as an actual problem solver is because, firstly the marine life in our oceans will be disrupted. Constant absorbing of water from the ocean will cause for some kind of disturbance and change to our marine life. Secondly it is a highly expensive process because sea water is salty,and to extract water from the ocean, large amounts of steel equipment will be required, the salty water will cause the steel to rust and that will call for the steel equipment to be replaced every so often. This is extremely expensive to keep up with for a life time not to forget desalination of the water to make it drinkable. This will mean that various sectors of our country’s wellbeing will have to be neglected so that we can have access to clean desalinated water. considering all this, the lengthy process of just having a glass of water will in future cost millions, but we don’t have to pay such a price. We need to invest in this precious resource today by preserving as much of it as we can. We also need to take better care of our environment. Pollution is a oneway ticket to a world of suffering in the future so lets stop it today.

OUR FUTURE WITHOUT WATER!!

Do you actually think about how much water you use every day? we exceed far beyond what we need and we don’t even realise it. It is tough to imagine people fighting over water, at some point, water will be so scarce that one could even get mugged and killed for it. Imagine a world where the  water resources are so few that the costs of water have to increase just so the people can have access to it. The poor will be helpless and the rich will get poor because without water there is no life. All the money will go towards getting water one way or another, people might have to be restricted to a glass per second day for each person to drink because there simply would be no water to go around for daily use. Taking a bath might not even be a priority anymore, maybe once or twice every two weeks. YES! The thought of such a situation is gruesome, but that will be the result if we don’t start using water wisely and cherishing it.

WATER RESOURCES

South Africa is rich with all kinds of resources, but water is not one of them. there is a huge demand for water resources, not just for domestic use but also in the growing industries such as agriculture, mining and urbanisation, to name a few. We are pretty much a dry country as our average rainfall per year is about 496mm, compared to the world average of 860mm per year. There have been solutions introduced to help lessen the impact of water shortage such as the water transfer schemes put in place. There are three schemes, namely; The Orange river scheme, The Tugela Vaal project and The Lesotho highlands project. these are called Basin transfer schemes and in this case, water is transfered from an area with high rainfall to an area of low rainfall and thus we are able to have water. There many be solutions for now, but the problem still remains, we need to save water and use it wisely. Water is far more precious and valuable than gold, Trust me! without water we wouldn’t even be able to have many of the things we so love and cherish today, so save water!!!