{"id":392779,"date":"2018-01-18T14:29:59","date_gmt":"2018-01-18T14:29:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=392779"},"modified":"2018-01-18T14:29:59","modified_gmt":"2018-01-18T14:29:59","slug":"cape-town-slashes-water-use-amid-drought","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2018\/01\/cape-town-slashes-water-use-amid-drought\/","title":{"rendered":"Cape Town slashes water use amid drought"},"content":{"rendered":"
The South African city of Cape Town will slash residents’ water allowance to 50 litres a day from next month amid fears that it could become the world’s first major city to run out of water.<\/p>\n
The city had reached a “point of no return”, Mayor Patricia de Lille said.<\/p>\n
Cape Town, a popular tourist destination, has been hit by its worst drought in a century.<\/p>\n
Ms De Lille warned that the city risked reaching “Day Zero” on 21 April, when taps in homes could run dry.<\/p>\n
“We can no longer ask people to stop wasting water. We must force them,” she said at a press conference.<\/p>\n
“Despite our urging for months, 60% of Capetonians are callously using more than 87 litres per day,” she added, referring to the current daily limit.<\/p>\n
A person uses about 15 litres per minute for a typical shower and the same amount when flushing a standard toilet, according to WaterWise, a South African water usage awareness campaign.<\/p>\n
Cape Town had earlier banned car washing and filling up swimming pools as part of efforts to conserve water.<\/p>\n
The Indian cricket team was also urged to take showers of no more than two minutes\u00a0during its tour of the city earlier this month.<\/p>\n
However, the measures would “simply not be enough” and the crisis had “reached a new severity necessitating a series of new emergency measures”, Ms De Lille said.<\/p>\n
Much of southern Africa has been recovering from a drought caused by the El Nino weather phenomenon, following heavy summer rains.<\/p>\n
However, Cape Town is still gripped by a drought and has had very low rainfall for the last three years.<\/p>\n
–<\/p>\n
Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The South African city of Cape Town will slash residents’ water allowance to 50 litres a day from next month amid fears that it could become the world’s first major city to run out of water. The city had reached a “point of no return”, Mayor Patricia de Lille said. Cape Town, a popular tourist […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":392785,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[107],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n