A survey on Senqu River and its major tributaries commenced yesterday and will continue until December 15, 2026.
Titled ‘The Fourth Joint Basin Survey (JBS4)’, it will cover the Vaal, Upper Orange-Senqu and Lower Orange river systems.
The project is being undertaken by the Orange–Senqu River Commission (ORASECOM), together with its partners, the University of South Africa, the Wilderness Project, the European Union and the German Government through the GIZ Transboundary Water Management in the SADC Region Project.
In a statement today, ORASECOM noted that the Joint Basin Survey has been conducted every five years since 2010. It is one of the organisation’s keytransboundary instruments for understanding how the shared river system is changing over time and for generating evidence to support its sustainable management by its riparian states, Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and South Africa.
The University of South Africa and the Wilderness Project will undertake the survey, in collaboration with officials from ORASECOM member states.
“The two teams will use complementary approaches to build a basin-widepicture of water quality and ecosystem health, combining detailed scientific assessments at selected sites with observations and sampling along the river system.
“The surveys will focus mainly on selected tributaries of the Vaal and Orange–Senqu rivers, as well as selected groundwater sites,” the statement noted.
It further indicated that the teams will assess water quality and pollution sources, including bacteria, nutrients, metals, microplastics, and other pollutants that can persist in the environment.
The surveys will also examine the health of river ecosystems by studying aquatic plants and organisms, fish, riverside vegetation and the condition of river habitats. They will also assess groundwater and its connection to the wider river system.
