Exploring nature-based solutions to droughts and floods in the Limpopo basin (original) (raw)

Abstract

Southern Africa faces both severe droughts and strong floods. Communities describe how they are impacted by both extremes, but do not regard them as connected. They prepare for droughts by implementing water-saving measures and crop changes, but report doing little to prepare for floods. Governance actors instead try to manage both extremes, for example by installing dams that can capture floodwater to increase water availability during dry seasons. In the Connect4WR project, we combined community and governance interviews and workshops with scenario modelling to explore more nature-based solutions focusing on subsurface storage and infiltration. The governance actors in the four countries of the Limpopo (Botswana, Zimbabwe, South Africa and Mozambique) were keen to explore effects of afforestation, sand dams, managed aquifer recharge, and rainwater harvesting. The coupled surface-water-groundwater model we set up, showed that these measures can successfully reduce both droughts and...

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