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Mapping Water Sources in the Upper Mbarali River Sub-Catchment

 FIELD REPORT NOVEMBER 2021

Mapping Water Sources in the Upper Mbarali River Sub-Catchment

One of the Mbarali River source of water in Waging'ombe district Njombe Region
 

Introduction
Mbarali river is one of sub-catchment within Rufiji River Basin in the Southern Highland of Tanzania facing ongoing degradation due to land use change, poor institutional management and climate change. Degradation and poor management of water sources have affected river flows in both quantity and quality with devastating impacts on the downstream including the coastal and marine ecosystems through increased inflow of nutrients, sediment deposits, and variation of flow regimes. The exponential growth of water demand catalyzed by the increase of anthropogenic activities and population growth increase the pace of
environmental degradation within the sources and along the entire river to the downstream. There are initiatives which have been taken for water sources management such as establishment of water users association (WUA) as indicated in Water Resources Act of 2009. Within Mbarali River sub-catchment, three WUAs have been formed including MBUMTILA, BALALI and MPANDO which located at the upper (the water towers), and mid part of the catchment in Wanging’ombe and Makete District also JUWAMBA and JUWAMBACHI which are located at the downstream of the catchment in Mbarali District. Apart from the established initiatives, still the progress is slow in water sources conservation and management which may hinder the implementation of environmental flow in Mbarali river for sustainability of riverine ecology and downstream users.   Water sources degradation in Mbarali River sub-catchment occurs at different and variable scales and restoration efforts are required in both streams and catchments to improve conditions and manage flows. To ensure effective restoration and conservation practices, it is vital to identifying all water sources and assesses different environmental challenges associated including anthropogenic activities within or nearby the source which will help to provides proper interventions for conservations and protection. 

Objective of the Task

The main objective of the field survey was to conduct assessment and mapping of water sources within Mbarali River sub-catchment. Specific the study aim,

  1. Identifying and map water sources in Mbarali River sub-catchment
  2. Assessing level of human induced pressure that detrimentally affect the water source
  3. To identifying conservation intervention to be taken onboard at a specific water source.

Stakeholder consultation

Consultations were made with the key stakeholders including Rufiji Basin Water Board (RBWB) officials, Ward and Village leaders and member from WUA and Village Environmental committee. Open handed questions were discussed to get an overview on the status of the water sources and conservation challenges, also possible management actions that could be taken to ensure sustainable management of water sources from anthropogenic activities which are unsustainable.


Some of the stakeholders whom were consulted

Field visit

The field survey was conducted in 20 villages of MBUMTULU WUA (Figure 2) for identification, assessment and
mapping available water sources. Point mapping using hand held GPS were used to map geographical position of each identified water sources. Attribute information including Name of water source, current status of the water source, level of human disturbance, water availability, observable threats to water sources, ownership, surrounding ecology were collected. Three (3) assessment criteria were set to assess the status of water sources (Table 1). Conservation interventions for each identified water source were then proposed and documented.
 
 
 
 
 

 

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