Citation:
Biniam Ashagre, Sue White, Shadrack Mwakalila, Philip Platts, Marije Schaafsma, Celina Smith, Water for Everyone, The ARC journal, Issue no. 29 pp15.
Abstract:
Around one in ten Tanzanians source their
water from rivers originating in the Eastern
Arc Mountains (EAM). In Dar es Salaam, the
main water source is the Ruvu River, flowing
from Uluguru Nature Reserve, from which around
300 million litres are extracted daily. Moreover, at
least half of Tanzanian hydroelectricity is generated
from EAM rivers.
The EAM contain moist forest assemblages as
well as large areas of miombo woodland at lower
elevations and on drier leeward aspects. These
biomes are believed to play significant roles in the
regulation of hydrological flow, flood mitigation
and soil conservation. Despite this hypothesised
importance, the interactions between river flow,
habitat type and land use are not well understood.
To explore these complexities, the Valuing the Arc
programme (VTA) parameterised a detailed, daily
water model called SWAT to model the hydrology
of two focal catchments: the Sigi in Tanga Region
and the Ruvu in Morogoro region. In addition, we
developed a broader scale, monthly model (WatR) to
tentatively explore hydrological flow across the wider
VTA region.
