The latest issue of Africa Geographic (Oct 2009), focuses on the criticality, threat to, and scarceness of Africa's fresh water resources. A continuous thread in many of the articles is that key components of the fresh water supply are often located outside of existing protected areas and therefore vulnerable to all sorts of human induced pressures. Over exploitation through deforestation, pollution of the water resources, and excessive use of available water supplies, are examples that not only have local impacts, but also significant negative downstream impacts. One article identifies an example of human activities actually having a devastating impact upstream of the actual activity. The enlarging of the Massingir Dam on the Olifants River in Mozambique caused flooding of the upstream gorge located in the Kruger National Park, South Africa's flagship conservation area. Firstly, this allowed for easy illegal access into the park. Secondly, although the exact cause has not been identified, it is also possible that the flooding of the gorge and associated water contamination corresponded with the mass death of over 200 crocodiles in the gorge, during the winter of 2008. The gorge is a critical breeding location for Nile crocodiles (Crocodylus niloticus). The boundaries and location of the Kruger National Park provide a stark example of a conservation area totally dependant on water sources located outside the park itself. The water sources and rivers are located in areas with intense human activities such as mining, agriculture and forestry. All six of the main rivers flow west to east through the park. Last year, during our backpacking trip to South America, we gained first hand experience of another staggering example of river pollution causing untold damage to fish and wildlife species downstream, as well as local communities dependant on the river for their survival. In Bolivia, we travelled for three days down stream to Rurrenebaque by boat, spending two nights camped on the river bank, and experiencing the rain forest predominantly from the river. A large part of the trip was outside of conservation areas. Gold extraction from the river continues by both family size and larger company operations. The alluvial gold is extracted by using a sluice box to separate the heavier sediment, and mercury to amalgamate the gold. A proportion of this mercury ends up back in the river entering the food chain. What these examples highlight is the need for conservation approaches to focus at an ecosystem level as a minimum, taking into account the full fresh water process including fresh water sources, catchment areas, the entire length of rivers and streams, and including ground water aquifers. Historically , many conservation areas have been proclaimed without taking into account ecosystem boundaries. An added challenge is that this more than often will require collaboration between neighboring countries.
