20.01.2025
The recent heavy rains experienced in Lusaka and other parts of the country should be harvested in order to reduce pressure on groundwater sources and stimulate water supply sustainability amidst climate change events, said Dr. Kelvin Kamayoyo a renowned river conservation advocate and Technical Advisor for African Rivers.
Conceivably, Zambia need to embrace rainwater harvesting techniques because rainwater source is now becoming unpredictable owing to the unrelenting climate change events. This is not a new concept because there are already other countries globally that have advanced in this area and water conservation such as Singapore, China, Brazil, New Zealand, German, Australia, and Thailand.
Simply put rainwater harvesting involves the collection, filtering and storing of rainwater unlike allowing it to run off or evaporate unecessarily. Rainwater can be harvested from the roofs of houses, office buildings or shopping malls and then stored in reservoirs or tanks for future use in industries or households chores.
Notwithstanding, the rivers and other waterbodies are currently excited because of the sustained heavy rains recently being experienced in Lusaka and other parts of the country. Certainly, society has a compelling reason to rejoice attributed to exponential rains and because the benefits are myriad, with anticipated positive impact on the energy, tourism, agriculture, livestock and fisheries sectors in Zambia.
Besides the aforesaid positive externalities of the heavy rainwater, it is critical to note that rainwater helps to remove chemicals from the air. However, for the country to fully maximize the benefits of the heavy rains there is need to aggressively harvest the rainwater before it’s inundated by the vicious climate change.
Arguably, there is need to rollout sensitisation programmes on the importance of rainwater harvesting and encouraging builders to integrate in their construction plans the designs that allows for rainwater harvesting pathways.
