KSA : 1&2 (Water resources and ecosystems)
Thrust 1 (Governance and institutional arrangements)
Programme 2 (Policy, science and implementation)
Title : A lower Breede River scoping study to support future water-related research and guide ecological infrastructure management
ToR ID : 1009886
Contact Person: Roderick Juba roderickj@wrc.org.za
Closing Date : 16 November 2021
Brief description of ToR
Certain land-use practices along the Breede River in the Western Cape are viewed as a major contributors to water quality issues in the middle to lower Breede,
leading to ecological degradation and impacting on water use downstream.
Water quality declines downstream, with changes in salinity, nutrient enrichment, microbial pollution, reduction in dissolved oxygen, and turbidity and siltation.
Knock-on effects from these include ecological degradation through issues such as increased algal blooms and eutrophication, and direct economic losses due to increased maintenance and water treatment costs,
and possibly through use of contaminated irrigation water on export products. While these issues present a great opportunity for furthering social learning, co-developing landscape-based solutions,
and establishing collaborative partnerships to coordinate long-term ecological infrastructure management interventions, there is still a clear need for better understanding of the social landscape,
including its various challenges and opportunities.
This project seeks to increase our understanding of the social-ecological landscape of the middle to lower Breede River, to identify opportunities for improved ecological infrastructure management.
