Abstract
Global water scarcity has accelerated decline in available per capita renewable water resources. Due to the scarcity of water, various institutions in the water supply and distribution value chain, including authorities, organisations and government departments, have devised various strategies to manage various aspects of water management.
The water utility under investigation is experiencing an increase in non-revenue water which is impeding progress in the water conservation plan and cost management. The objectives of this research were to determine a strategy that might be used in a water utility to manage non-revenue water (NRW), as well as to understand how community involvement might impact the reporting of leakage and pipe bursts on the distribution mains in order to reduce the non-revenue water. Structured interviews were conducted at the water utility to gain insight into how non-revenue water was managed by the utility in order to achieve these objectives. This aided in identifying critical activities that could be used to improve the non-revenue water management strategy.
Findings revealed that developing NRW assessment levels, water policies development and water examination and surveillance could aid in NRW reduction. However, water examination and surveillance proved to be less suitable without stakeholder involvement. This meant that water examination and surveillance could improve NRW reduction if it involved community members.
These findings on community involvement in NRW will help water utilities reduce the impact by including in their strategy the targeting of communities that experience significant disparities in tap water pressure and raising awareness in the community, gather data on reports about community suspected of not having meters for water consumption and periodic observing and distinguishing household clients for unmetered water consumption.
Keywords: Non-revenue water, Water conservation, Water demand management, Water management system, Community involvement