The eThekwini Municipality turnaround strategy to reduce Non-Revenue Water (NRW) is beginning to yield positive results.
Outstanding leaks have been reduced from 9,000 in June 2025 to 979 on October 20, 2025, said Acting Executive Director for Technical Services Ednick Msweli at an Executive Committee (EXCO) meeting on Tuesday.
Msweli said the latest data presented by the Water Service Directorate highlighted a decrease of 2.9% of NRW for quarter one, from July to September 2025.
As a result of the 2.9% decrease when compared to the same period in the previous year, NRW is currently at 52.9% for the current quarter.
Msweli explained that the 58% of NRW that the municipality previously reported is based on a 12-month average.
He stated that the monthly data fluctuates, adding that the reduction is a positive step towards achieving the target to reduce the overall NRW.
“The current reduction is attributed to multifaceted interventions, which include the deployment of plumbers to reservoir zones with high water loss, the maintenance and installation of meters, and Industrial, commercial, and institutional meter upgrades, to name a few,” he said.
Other progressive measures reported include the insourcing of 31 plumbers, which is at an advanced stage.
According to Msweli, approximately 80,000 restrictors have been installed throughout the municipality, and water operations teams are conducting field investigations to identify zones with high losses for further interventions.
Msweli said that the newly established NRW branch structure has been approved and is being finalised. This branch will be implementing the NRW reduction strategy, which is linked to the eThekwini Water and Sanitation (EWS) Turnaround Strategy (TAS).
The NRW reduction strategy includes all collaborative efforts from five departments within the EWS, namely, water design, water operations, customer services technical, admin customer services, and the auxiliary department.
“While waiting for the implementation of the new structure, which is yet to commence, the interview process is well under way, the management has created an interim task team to mobilise initiatives in the interim period,” Msweli said.
Forty-two plumbers have been assigned to all regions as part of the NRW initiatives. They have been split into two groups to deal with reservoirs with high physical losses assigned to councillor escalations, and where zones have increased statistics in reported leaks.
Ish Praladh, chairperson of the eThekwini Ratepayers and Residents Association (ERRA), was concerned about the slow pace of the city in tackling NRW at informal settlements.
Municipal records show that the city has over 590 urban informal settlements, with an estimated 316,000 households.
“While we applaud the effort to fix leaks and broken pipes, ratepayers still witness water being abused at informal settlements, where there are car washes and businesses. Ratepayers note that taps continuously leak in the majority of these settlements, and because there are no meters, nobody can know the scale or the loss,” Prahladh said.
