South Africa is losing about R26 billion a year through water that is produced, pumped, and treated but never paid for.
This was revealed by the Minister of Water and Sanitation, Pemmy Majodina, in a written parliamentary reply to uMkhonto (MKP) weSizwe MP Visvin Reddy, who had asked about the scale of non-revenue water losses and what progress has been made to reduce them.
Majodina said close to 47.3% of all municipal water in South Africa is classified as non-revenue water, meaning almost half of the country’s treated water does not generate income for municipalities.
"Non-Revenue Water (NRW) is the volume of water supplied by the Water Services Authority for which it receives no income or revenue.
"NRW incorporates several components, including water authorised for use by a consumer, however, is not billed (metered or unmetered), water lost through leaks in municipal distribution systems (physical losses), illegal connections, and revenue foregone as a result of weak municipal billing and revenue collection systems (commercial losses)".
