THE government has revealed that it is planning to drill 10 000 boreholes starting with the dry regions in Zimbabwe to provide water supply and mitigate the impact of an El Nino-induced drought.
This was revealed during the World Food Programme and Food and Agriculture Organisation panel discussion on El Nino and drought mitigation strategies held at the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair last week.
Leonard Munamati, advisory services director in the Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development ministry, said the government had engaged partners on ways to mitigate the effects of the drought.
“These are the issues that we were talking about and we are saying, one of the important measures is to make sure that we have got water available in the dry areas,” Munamati said.
“One of the strategies is borehole drilling and we as government are targeting to drill 10 000 boreholes before year end.”
The project, Munamati said, would involve the drilling of at least 1 000 boreholes every month.
“So we have drilling rigs which are under Zinwa (Zimbabwe National Water Authority), which is a parastatal that works with the ministry.
“The President [Emmerson Mnangagwa] said we should prioritise the dry areas and these are in natural regions 4 and 5 because that is where we have water challenges, for instance Matabeleland North and South provinces,” he said.
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