Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Who Says The Next Rainy Season Gonna Be Better?

Nobody. In fact, if global warming has modified rain patterns it would be silly to stay put and expect Mare-aux-Vacoas to fill up with the same regularity as it used to. So that we may be better off building smaller reservoirs in the places where rainfall has been more generous in the recent past. And give phase two of the Midlands dam the go-ahead. In other words we need a good plan. The snag is that no ministry has been taking care of planning for a while now. This hasn't changed either with the latest permutation in the cabinet.

Despair not. We still have a direct line to God.

10 comments:

Zan_Bat_Ishttt_C said...

Pa grave pena dilo dans MAV, kapave ale baigner la mer.

akagugo said...

Despair not: we also have a a flawed press covering a study, flawed too.

Yes, not all Rodriguans are connected to the CWA's water mains. But those who conducted the study should have gone to additional detail by asking those house-owners without a piped water supply how they obtain water to cook, drink and do household chores. In fact, some Rodrigans (50% of them, now we know for sure) do not NEED a piped water supply because they can rely on rainwater harvesting.
About the toilets, they should have asked the house-owners who 'do not have toilets' where they go for their natural needs. If one is really keen on finding the why, the topography is so rocky that it is not possible to dig out one absorption pit for each house, especially outside the capital: all the houses located near one another use common (detached) toilets. This is part of Rodrigan associative / collaborative culture. Some even have a common pool of essential tools scattered around the community for collective use when needed.

The mauritian egoistic model is not applicable to Rodrigan environment at all. Therefore, the study itself is flawed by assuming that Rodrigans need the same level of comfort as Mauritians - that's an awfully short-sighted study designed by CSO officers.

Also, rushing to the conclusion stating that "Comparativement, Rodrigues fait figure de parent pauvre" does not relfect the reality of Rodrigues and is actually an unnecessarily unfair comparison - shame on the author of the article, and anyone who has supervised that publication.

akagugo said...

Ahem, if I merely notice that our venerable Mare aux Vacoas is back in the "zone rouge", am I eligible for arrest for "complot"?

Sanjay Jagatsingh said...

Si zame sa arive amenn ti iPad uswa enn smartphone pu kontinyer fer komenter ;-)

akagugo said...

A bon? Gagn drwa rentt dan cazott-poul ar portab?? Mo ti kwar ziss subutex ek gandia ki gagné karé-karé...

akagugo said...

A nice recap of our reserves in water here.

En bonus, la palme de la phrase (fécale) de l'année revient sans conteste à Raschid:
"une hausse de 35% n'est pas énorme comparé au prix d'un paquet de cigarettes"

Sanjay Jagatsingh said...

Ayo kifer nu pa ti mazinn sa avan: 35% ogmentasyon delo kan ena kupir depi 12 mwa ena mem lefe ki nicotine patch. Mersi dokter...

Sanjay Jagatsingh said...

We got 13% more rain in 2017 than in 2016. Or almost 4bn cubic metres. We used less than 1/4 of that.

akagugo said...

Do you recall that Cape Town's April 2018?
That date was due to mark the time at which their only reservoir would have become so low that their taps would have dun dry. But that did not happen - how?
Incredibly, their collective efforts at saving water beat the predictions, and despite the very heavily delayed rains did eventually come back, they are managing quite comfortably now. All because they planned for doomsday by showing people how to live into doomsday: no showers (replaced by bath sponges), no hand-washing at the lavatory (sanitising sprays does the job - better), no toilet flushing (not for the pipi, only for the brown stuff), banning high-pressure washing and swimming pools (no 'guett-figir'), high pressure nozzles for kitchens and domestic wash-basins (only a spoonful of water is actually required to rinse off soap off a pair of hands or a plate, would you believe it?), steam-laundry for en-masse washing, and many many more everyday tips that were designed by the locals themselves.
It took them some weeks to get the habit, but now it's second nature to them, and they're readiness for doomsday will actually allow them to last for 2 years more...
Dodoland: challenge?

Sanjay Jagatsingh said...

Interesting measures. But I am guessing they don't have a 50% leakage in their water systems. I wonder how we would use one spoon to rinse off our hands. I'm guessing it depends on the washing liquid used.