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Grabouw and Elgin farmers have released 10-million cubic meters of water (10-billion litres) from Eikenhof Dam to to assist Cape Town with drought relief. The City’s current consumption rate is about 550-million a day, and the donation is expected to last between 18-20 days.

A video released on social media shows water gushing out of sluice gates into Eikenhof Dam to feed the water network into Cape Town.

Chief Executive officer of Groenland Water Users Association (GWUA) Johan Groenewald says the water is a donation from farmers in Elgin and Grabouw. It’s coming mainly from the Eikenhof water scheme and private dams in the Upper Kogelberg catchment area.

GWUA is made up of fruit growers around Elgin and Grabouw and their  donation will be a “once-off” contribution.

The water will hopefully help the Mother City push back Day Zero even further.

“We were blessed [with rain], even though it is not as much as usual,” GWUA’s chief executive Johan Groenewald said.

The City of Cape Town said on Monday they were pushing back Day Zero to mid-May, due to the agriculture industry using less water.

In a statement, the city said, “Agricultural usage is therefore likely to drop significantly over the next weeks. Currently, the agriculture sector is drawing about 30% of the water in the supply scheme. This should fall to approximately 15% in March and 10% in April. It must be noted that the City does not have any control over agricultural releases, so this is the best estimate we can make with the information at hand.”

The water crisis has affected the agriculture sector severely, Agri Western Cape announced that their water supply has been reduced between 60% and 87%.

 

Picture: Twitter

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