Beyond thirst in Zimbabwe - Climate Weekly
It’s Friday again. Welcome to Climate Weekly!
Each week we’ll ask one guest writer from our network to give you a short selection of some of the best climate news from their region.
This week, we jump from Asia to Southern Africa, with Nesia Mhaka, the Environment and Climate correspondent at the Herald newspaper in Zimbabwe.
Hi all, and Mhoro wakadii??
I’m Nesia, and that’s a greeting in Shona, the biggest language in Zimbabwe, where we’ve been facing a serious water crisis over the last 5 years.
I live in Harare, our biggest city, and we only get water here 3 days a week.
This month, we shifted to a new phase of water scarcity.
In Bulawayo, our second biggest city, taps are now only running once a week, a decision that the government believes will have to be maintained until the next rainy season. That’s in November.
Late last year I wrote about how in rural Bikita, more than 10,000 villagers were reliant on a single borehole. I interviewed women who had literally walked 10kms to that single borehole. In February, Aljazeera called this everyday experience “Beyond Thirst”
This isn’t ‘new’ here, but 2 days ago, a colleague at the Chronicle wrote almost the same story about Hwange, with a quote that just struck me,
“We are now forced to spend several hours queuing for water because the only borehole that is working isn’t pumping enough water as evidenced by a sharp decrease in terms of the volume of water coming out,” said Mrs Rachel Nyathi, a single mother of five.
Yesterday I visited Hopley, one of the poorest suburbs in Harare, to see how my neighbours are coping with the situation. Since the community’s wells have now dried up, people are searching for water in graveyards.
Last year, local resident Munyaradzi Masinjara was one of the first to begin searching for water in the graveyard, built on wetlands, and selling it back for $1.50 a bucket. Today in Hopley, the same buckets are being re-sold at 5x the price.
With COVID-19 lockdowns, the situation doesn’t seem to be getting any better. One in three of my fellow Zimbabweans are hungry, and the government worries that the economy could shrink by up to 20% this year since the lockdowns began.
With another 6 months till our next wet season, I fear we are in for a slow, painful year of climate impacts, a situation that won’t make the headlines.
From Climate Tracker
Cyclone Amphan has hit India and Bangladesh this week. This is the most powerful storm ever recorded in the Bay of Bengal, and the most potent to make landfall in the two Indian countries in the last decade. Mahsin Hammuda is helping Climate Tracker bring you the latest developments, which you can follow on this Twitter thread.
The lockdown measures put in place in many places around the world are translating into blue skies and fresh air for people living in some of the world’s largest and most polluted cities. All of them? No! Hanoi and Jakarta are being left behind, with only barely noticeable improvements. Mai Hoang and Nariswari Yudianti find out more.
New Zealand, Sweden, the UK, France, Denmark… and soon Spain? The Southern European country may soon join the net-zero club, after the Government presented its brand new climate change law draft, that will now be debated in Parliament. Eduardo Robaina analyzes the most important details of a game-changing law for Spain.
What else we’re reading
Here’s some incredible photography and analysis of the Food crisis in East Africa from The Walrus, a Canadian longform magazine.
In a super quick How-To piece, Change.org shares how they used real-world protest tactics to make a Twitter impact in Germany this week.
Photo of the Week
This photo was taken by Nesia Mhaka as Hopley residents searched for water in their local graveyards.
Up Next Week
Next week, we cross to Elizabeth Kostina from the US. She is the youngest fellow at the Centre for Conscious Design, and is set for a special Design-themed issue.