People of the South

Water-short Namibia strikes it rich

A joint Namibian-German team of geohydrologists last week confirmed the existence of a massive aquifer with potentially up to 15-billion cubic metres of fresh water beneath Ohangwena, enough to supply the area’s current needs for four centuries.

“It was something of a side product of a technical training programme,” said team leader Martin Quinger, of the German Federal Institute of Geo-Science and Natural Resources, of the events that led to the discovery of the pristine, 10000-year-old body of water beneath the flat sand plains of northern Ohangwena, Namibia’s most densely populated region.