In a drive to address issues of portable water supply in Lilongwe city, the Lilongwe Water Board (LWB) has taken shift action to stabilize water supply and reduce service disruptions by constructing an additional Water treatment work 3 with a capacity of 50 thousand cubic meters per day.
The project will be completed by March next year.
Speaking during the media tour of construction site on wednesday in Lilongwe, LWB Chief Executive Officer, Silli Mbewe told The Atlas Malawi that the treatment work 3 will cushion the gap that the institution is currently having in terms of demand and supply.
He said that due to issues of urbanization,Lilongwe city is growing for about 4.5% per anum and the demand for water is heavily increasing.
He added that currently, they are producing 125 thousand cubic meters per day which is not enough hence constructing another treatment work 3 which will be producing 50 thousand cubic meters per day to meet the demand.
“our production capacity looking at treatment plant 1 and 2 is 125 thousand cubic meters per day. Now the treatment work 3 will now add another 50 thousand cubic meters that will take us to 175 thousand cubic meters per day which will be adequate to bridge the current deficit that we are having in sustaining the demand”, said Mbewe.
In his remarks, the LWB Southern Zone Manager , Dan Kafuka said the project is funded by the European Investment Bank with a sum of 20 million Us Dollars to increase the production capacity so that they supply Water to all customers.
Kafuka also cited the negative impact of human activities by people living along the lilongwe river bank saying that it is heavily affecting their operation in as far as providing good quality water is concerned.
“Most of the times people damp waste along the river. This compromise water quality because when we are tapping raw water which is not in good quality it also push us to spend more on chemicals to treat water to be of good quality to meet the standards of Malawi Bueral of standards as well as the world health Organization”, explained Kafuka.
Kafuka said that they are doing their best to sensitize people along the the river to make sure that their catchment is well managed.
