Wood and water: an historical assessment of South Africa's past and present forestry policies as they relate to water conservation

Abstract

Finding ways to conserve limited water supplies while promoting economic development has been, and will continue to be, one of South Africa's most enduring environmental challenges. South Africa's forestry sector has sat – often controversially – at the crossroads of policy debates regarding both water conservation and economic development. This historical analysis examines how conflicts surrounding exotic afforestation led to the establishment of the Jonkershoek Forestry Research Station in 1935. It demonstrates how research findings from Jonkershoek formed the basis of a comprehensive national catchment management strategy that tried to harmonise the afforestation of exotic forests, the preservation of indigenous vegetation and the rights of downstream water users. This framework dominated water conservation policy discussions and outcomes from the late 1960s to the late 1980s. This programme fell into decline when catchment management was handed over to provinces in the late 1980s and a raft of new post-apartheid legislation and plans – the centrepiece being the National Water Act in 1998 – redirected research funding and forestry policies established between 1935 and 1994. In conclusion, we suggest that South Africa's water policies, as they related to exotic forests, should be reviewed in light of broader historical, scientific and economic findings.

Keywords:

• environmental history
• forests
• water
• South Africa
• hydrology
• catchment management
• policy

Notes

¹ ‘The Commission members included the head of the Union Department of Irrigation (Heinrich Sebastian Davel-du Toit), prominent farmers (Selby Montague Gadd, George Augustus Kolbe, Reenen Jacob van Reenen), and the government's Agricultural Chemist Arthur Stead.

² For examples see debate between Keet and Pole-Evans in the memorandum and correspondence, J.D. Keet memorandum to “All Professional Officers” 17 July 1935 “Afforestation in Relation to Natural Flora and the Effect of Afforestation on Water Supplies”, FOR 330 1054/7/2, National Archives of South Africa, Pretoria (hereafter NASA-P).

³ Also see Phillips to Smuts, 3 March 1935; Phillips to Smuts, 4 August 1935, Smuts Collection 238/53, NASA-P.

⁴ “Forest Planting in South Africa: Colonel Reitz's Alarm at the Effect of Erosion”, Natal Mercury, 3 Sept 1935.

⁵ “Forest Planting in South Africa: Colonel Reitz's Alarm at the Effect of Erosion”, Natal Mercury, 3 Sept 1935.

⁶ Chief Conservator of Forests C.E. Legat to the District Forest Officer: Research, 17 January 1913; Hydrographic Surveyor to Chief Conservator of Forests, 22 January 1913. R7649/711, South African Forestry Research Institute files, CSIR, Pretoria.

⁷ Conservator of Forests Transvaal and Orange Free State Conservancy J.D. Keet to Chief Conservator of Forests, 7 May 1924, R7649/711, South African Forestry Research Institute files, CSIR, Pretoria; gauging at this site continued until 1963, but ceased without result: email from Brian Jackson, Inkomati Catchment Management Agency, 14 June 2013; there are no reasons on record, but it may be that the early reports on the lack of reliable records prejudiced the study as being unsound.

⁸ See J.J. Kotze's comments in Fourth British Empire Forestry Conference Proceedings, p. 293.

⁹ Files of the Jonkershoek Forest Research Station held at the CSIR, Stellenbosch (hereafter Jonkershoek CSIR) Annual Report of the District Forest Officer, Jonkershoek 1937/38.

¹⁰ Monthly reports of the Forest Research Officer, Jonkershoek, 1936–1945, CSIR Stellenbosch at http://digi.nrf.ac.za/dspace/handle/10624/375/search (accessed 27 July 2013).

¹¹ Earlier catchment studies in France, Switzerland and the White Mountains of New Hampshire did not meet design standards for sound inference (for instance see, Ice & Stednick, 2004). Wicht found the report by Bates and Henry inadequate because it included no proper statistical inference (Wicht, 1943).

¹² See Meyburgh and Wicht, 1966, pp. 71–90 on research employing the Fourcade rain gauge; for the statistical regression model, Wicht et al., 1969.

¹³ This was accomplished in 1969: Wicht et al., 1969.

¹⁴ R.A. Fisher, The Design of Experiments, 1937, in Wicht, 1943.

¹⁵ Likens and colleagues next reported the same 28 years later; see Likens et al., 1977, p. 25.

¹⁶ Several authors continue to claim that indigenous forests (as opposed to fynbos or grass) use less water than exotic trees. But in important forestry climatic zones, when there are similar conditions, water use by plantations and South African indigenous forests does not differ. See Gush, 2011, p. 167.

¹⁷ This is true if the measure is water-use efficiency, i.e. the amount of water consumed per unit of growth. In South Africa, water-use efficiency is highest in fast-growing species of Eucalyptus. See Wise et al., 2011.

¹⁸ In his early observations of daily rise and fall in streams during periods of drought, seldom reported anywhere at that time, Wicht speculated that this owed to the transpirational draft from riparian vegetation. Several later studies showed this to be correct. See Wicht, 1941b, pp. 34–49; Rycroft, 1955; Banks, 1961; Scott, 1999.

¹⁹ By 1981, approximately 4000 km² of private land in fynbos ecosystems had been proclaimed Mountain Catchment Area; ultimately, nearly 20 000 km² of private and State land was to be managed for water conservation in terms of this Act; Kruger, 1982, p. 44.

²⁰ National Water Act No 36 of 1998, Chapter 2.

²¹ National Water Act, section 21.

²² National Water Act, Part 3.

²³ This report notes that some of the apparent decline in this area may have been due to reporting errors.

²⁴ National Water Act Chapter 7.

²⁵ See, for example, the statement that tree plantations “squander our precious water”; http://www.geasphere.co.za/southafrica.htm#AreAllTreesGreenThespotlightonforestry accessed on 10 March 2013.

²⁶ National Water Act, Part 2; section 1(1)xxvii.

²⁷ Email communication, Pat Manders, Acting Executive Director, CSIR, April 15 2013.