Together investing in the future of South AFrica’s Freshwater ecosystems

This report reviews the second phase (2012-2014) of the WWF Sanlam Partnership, focusing on securing South Africa's freshwater ecosystems. The partnership integrates conservation efforts with corporate sustainability, targeting the protection of strategic water source areas, the implementation of water stewardship in business, and the integration of water risk into financial investment and insurance practices.

• Research conducted by WWF South Africa and the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), funded by Sanlam, identified that 8% of South Africa's land area contains 21 strategic water source areas that provide 50% of the country's surface water.
• The partnership has worked to integrate water risk into the financial sector, noting that 75% of JSE Top 40 companies responding to the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) Water Disclosure survey identified exposure to physical water risk. Efforts include developing a corporate water risk index to help investors assess JSE Top 40 listed companies.
• WWF's Water Balance programme, which uses a 'review, reduce, replenish' (R³) framework, has cleared over 1,200 hectares of invasive alien plants since 2010. This has resulted in over 2,490,000kl of water remaining in priority freshwater ecosystems annually and the creation of over 32,600 person days of work.
• The 'Journey of Water' campaign, run in 2013 with nearly 30 partners, aimed to reconnect urban users with healthy catchments. Between October 1, 2013, and March 26, 2014, the campaign achieved 78 media hits valued at nearly R11 million and won the 'Best Water Management and Efficiency Award' at the 2014 Mail & Guardian Greening the Future Awards.
• Sanlam implemented internal water-saving initiatives at its Cape Town and Johannesburg offices, including rainwater harvesting, grey water systems, and water filter tap retrofitting. These measures led to a 41% reduction in water usage in 2014 compared to a 2010 baseline.
• The partnership has promoted water stewardship in several South African regions, including the Pongola basin, the Eerste River, the George area, and Ceres. In the Upper Breede catchment of the Western Cape, WWF worked with stone fruit farmers, Marks & Spencer, and Woolworths to implement water stewardship practices.
• In collaboration with Santam and the Eden District Municipality, the partnership addressed flood and storm-water drainage risks. Research indicated that local changes to the ecological buffering capacity of the landscape had an equal or greater impact on risk exposure than climate change for wildfires, floods, and sea-storms.
• The partnership influenced the 2013 declaration of 180,000km2 of the Prince Edward Islands as a Marine Protected Area (MPA), which is one of the world's largest and the first for Africa.

APA

Nobula, S., Colvin, C., & Elliott-Wetmore, S. (2012). Together investing in the future of South AFrica’s Freshwater ecosystems. WWF South Africa. https://wwfafrica.awsassets.panda.org/downloads/wwf_sanlam_partnership_3_yr_review_final_web.pdf

Chicago

Nobula, Sindiswa, Christine Colvin, and Stephen Elliott-Wetmore. Together investing in the future of South AFrica’s Freshwater ecosystems. WWF South Africa, 2012. https://wwfafrica.awsassets.panda.org/downloads/wwf_sanlam_partnership_3_yr_review_final_web.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Nobula |first1=Sindiswa |last2=Colvin |first2=Christine |last3=Elliott-Wetmore |first3=Stephen |title=Together investing in the future of South AFrica’s Freshwater ecosystems |publisher=WWF South Africa |date=April 2012 |url=https://wwfafrica.awsassets.panda.org/downloads/wwf_sanlam_partnership_3_yr_review_final_web.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{nobula2012together, author = {Nobula, Sindiswa and Colvin, Christine and Elliott-Wetmore, Stephen}, title = {{Together investing in the future of South AFrica’s Freshwater ecosystems}}, institution = {WWF South Africa}, year = {2012}, month = apr, url = {https://wwfafrica.awsassets.panda.org/downloads/wwf_sanlam_partnership_3_yr_review_final_web.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }