photo:City of Harare Water and Sewer Performance Review 2016 BY ARCHIMEDES MUZENDA ON DECEMBER 3, 2016
The state-owned company has proposed to arrange financing and implementation part of the project according to The Herald newspaper. It will help the city to clean its potable water and reduce treatment fees at the same time.
"We would like to register our interest to work with the Ministry of Local Government, Public Works and National Housing and Harare City Council to implement Lake Chivero Water Environment Management and Treatment Project," the company said.
"We hereby submit our unsolicited expression of interest to arrange financing and implementation of this proposed project," the company told the council.
The council has now authorized acting town clerk Josephine Ncube to negotiate with the company which also seeks to start by investigating and analyzing pollution sources near the lake and developing a comprehensive treatment strategy.
The water quality at Lake Chivero has been deteriorating over the years because of heavy upstream domestic, agricultural and industrial pollution from Harare and the dormitory towns of Chitungwiza and Ruwa.
Lake Chivero in turn feeds into Lake Manyame which sometimes receives raw sewage from Norton.
As a result, the city has been pumping more money into treatment chemicals - as much as 3 million U.S. dollars a month - instead of investing in infrastructure rehabilitation.
It has been 20 years since Harare invested in the water sector, which has also resulted in infrastructure becoming inadequate to collect, treat and dispose of the waste water generated in the city, while in some cases the infrastructure has become obsolete.
Sino Hydro is also involved in the proposed construction of Kunzvi Dam to the north of Harare, which will boost supplies to the city which has been failing to provide enough supplies to its consumers.
Harare has a population of about 2.5 million and supplies water to a further 2 million in surrounding towns.
Sino Hydro is also involved in power station rehabilitation in the country.
