Opinion article by Prof Anthony Turton, Centre for Environmental Management, University of Free State.

On 30 May 2008, I was a guest speaker at the 10th Africa Day Conference hosted by UNISA in Pretoria. That was the first time I asked whether South Africa could become a failed state, citing international data on water scarcity. The evidence that I cited was visually powerful, but incomplete, so uncompelling. Yet that data confirmed work we had been doing at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in the aftermath of the publication of the National Water Resource Strategy (NWRS) in 2002. The NWRS data indicated that we had reached the limit of our water resource. We were forward-looking, and therefore in need of a model that could inform us about the future.

Approaching the water barrier

I had been impressed by the work done by Malin Falkenmark, an acclaimed Swedish scientist. She worked on the “hydraulic density of population” that measures the number of people that were competing for a given unit of water. She determined that a finite limit of 2 000 people per million litres per annum was the limit of known social stability. Any country approaching that “water barrier” would become increasingly unstable, and unless dealt with by means of technological intervention, would eventually disintegrate as a functional state.

Global data was placing us in the same risk category as the Middle East, but we also had a vibrant science, engineering and technology (SET) capability – a hangover from our arms development during the sanctions era – so we could avoid a disaster. This is the origin of my interest in state failure. By ignoring these warnings, we could see growing anarchy, increased unemployment, loss of investor confidence and the eventual collapse of the economy.

As society approaches the water barrier, policy options need to change. Before we reach the water barrier, the policy is all about building infrastructure to mobilise water for economic development. After the transition to fundamental water scarcity – when 2 000 people compete for one flow unit of water – the policy must logically be about retaining social cohesion. We must learn how to do better things with the little water we have left. This means protecting our rivers while developing the technology for recycling and recovery of water from waste and the ocean. Stated simply, my model was about the ability of an organ of state to self-correct.

The Vaal River case study

To self-correct, a coherent set of decision-making processes and procedures need to be in place. Data must flow into this decision-making black box. It must be processed and interpreted to the point where it triggers a logical decision to do something. That something is complex, for it is often abstract. It is very different to what has always been done in the past, so it requires imagination and cognitive skills embedded in a team of professionals that support the decision-making elites.

The Vaal River offers a unique case study in state failure because water lettuce was unknown before 2021. This means that when it was first reported to Rand Water at 14:31 on 5 February 2021, nobody knew what to do about it. The first person to respond was Francois van Wyk, a competent environmental scientist and water quality specialist at Rand Water. Responding immediately to the image, he launched an investigation on the river itself. As this was happening, river property owners sent an e-mail to the CEO of Rand Water on 10 February. We can therefore identify two specific moments of data input into the black box of decision-making that Rand Water represents. Van Wyk submitted his first formal report to the monthly management meeting during the second week of March 2021. We know that in March 2021, Rand Water formally took note of the presence of water lettuce, reported from two different locations.

The plant in question was unknown, so there was no record of its explosive growth rate on South African rivers contaminated by sewage. The sewage had become an issue a decade earlier, culminating with the deployment of the South African Defence Force in 2019. With the perfect vision of hindsight, we now know that sewage, warm temperatures, and water lettuce equals explosive growth.

The officials became alarmed at the level of anger from society, so they started to make a series of flawed decisions. Central to that panic was the ill-advised use of Glyphosate, a highly controversial chemical not licensed for use on water lettuce in South Africa. The crisis overwhelmed the capacity of the state to respond. It was an emergency, so shortcuts were taken in the decision-making process. Assumptions were made that other entities knew more than they actually did. Relentless pressure from increasingly impatient landowners, losing business from the impenetrable raft of water lettuce, pushed the authorities over the edge. All these factors combined, resulting in the authorisation of Glyphosate on a river of national importance, but oblivious to the depth of public sensitivity over the chemical. Report 3107/1/23 from the Water Research Commission, cautioned the decision-maker on page 6 by drawing attention to known long-term impacts that are not yet understood, often caused by additives. This cautionary note lists hepatorenal risk (damage to liver and kidney), teratogenicity (mutations), tumorigenicity (tumour forming) and transgenerational risk (the probability that the next generation of people could be affected).

Time is no longer on our side

These are all serious matters requiring sober reflection and rational decision-making. We now know that the sands of time have run out. An invasive plant, unheard of in 2021, has literally overwhelmed the Vaal River in 2024. In three years, the bureaucratic processes could not avert a disaster that has the capacity to destroy the river on which 60% of the national economy and around 20 million humans depend. More importantly, what took five decades (2 650 months) to happen in Hartbeespoort Dam, occurred in just 36 months on the Vaal. And so, as we return to Malin Falkenmark and her water barrier, we can say with growing confidence, that we are destroying what little water we have left. Our inability to self-correct is accelerating the advance of the water barrier, beyond which economic development and social stability is increasingly unlikely. We are polluting the little water we have left, with a chemical that it highly contentious, yet was chosen as the last line of defence in a rapidly unfolding calamity. It was like grasping floating flotsam as the Titanic slipped under the water in the cold Atlantic Ocean.

We can also say that at precisely 14:31 on 5 February 2021, the state failed in the water sector, because it was unable to respond to a risk that had never been encountered before. The take-home message is that we need to wake up, because it is in nobody’s interest to live in a failing state. If water lettuce, feeding on sewage, can cause so much damage, then what about the pathogens also thriving in that same water? How long can we continue to discharge untreated sewage into our rivers and expect no public health risks?

Time is no longer on our side. The rate of change now exceeds the capacity of our decision-making processes to cope. The dominoes are falling. Let’s think out of the box and stop the flow of sewage into our rivers in the first place. Now that’s a radical thought indeed.