Protection of Borehole Water Quality in Sub-Saharan Africa using Minimum Safe Distances and Zonal Protection

In Africa, groundwater plays an increasingly important role as a source of potable water, more so in rural communities where the cost implication of routing surface water supplies may far exceed the budgets of local water service authorities. Protection of groundwater resources requires good planning and a concerted effort from the legislative level right down to the enforcement and implementation level. The latter is essential in site-specific management and circumventing potential health threats that may result from the consumption or contact with contaminated groundwater. The reality in sub-Saharan Africa unfortunately is that these institutional structures do not exist and where they do exist implementation is problematic. This paper advocates that whilst zonal protection of groundwater resources is theoretically a good management option for protection of groundwater resource quality, practically its successful implementation can only be carried out once many of the sub-Saharan countries have their legal, institutional and socioeconomic frameworks in place. However, whilst working towards achieving those objectives even protection at a basic level like the implementing of minimum setback distances around groundwater resources and paying close attention to borehole development standards will offer sufficient basic protection to these vital resources.