Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) - partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 11 May 2010

By: Christo Marais – Working for Water: Natural Resource Management Programmes

It has often been said that environmentalists are “underselling the value of their products” with the result that their arguments are not being heard in mainstream economic debates. Historically, we have not been willing to put a value to biodiversity and environmental services. How do we value nature and what is the value of nature, they have argued. During the last few decades though, this has begun to change.

Pezula's rehabilitation programme has cleared over 300ha of alien trees and vegetation

With the advent of global climate change and the need for carbon sequestration and mitigation measures, the global face of natural resource management has changed. Although not as well-developed internationally, water markets are following the trend set by the carbon market.

So often when water resource management is being considered, the management options focus on augmentation and engineering solutions to water quantity and quality rather than the full spectrum of resource management options.

The impact of land management and the management of natural water resources such as wetlands, rivers and catchments is seldom seriously considered. For example, the drying up of our catchments, degradation and transformation of our wetlands, river banks and floodplains impacts on the proper functioning of these water resource systems by decreasing the amount of water absorbed into the systems and increasing the intensity of floods.

Furthermore, when invasive alien trees out-compete natural vegetation in these areas, this results not only in changing the flows, but also causes major water losses due to significantly increased water use.

This has a direct impact on the availability of water in our rivers, aquifers and even on the yield of dams.

A recent study has shown that 4 percent of utilisable water, or registered water use, is being lost due to invasive alien trees in our catchments, wetlands, river banks and floodplains. If left unchecked, this could increase to more than 16 percent within a relatively short period of time. Continue reading Water markets follow trend set by carbon markets