IS ALL ABOUT THE SAFETY OF OUR WATER RESOURCES
About Us
The Water Resources Management (WRM) of the Natural Resources Division (NRD) under Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources is responsible for monitoring and management the Kingdom water resources and providing advice to the Government regarding underground water issues among other geological activities. This vital resource is limited in the Kingdom due to unavoidable growth of population; climate change and related disasters that have directly impacted this highly valuable and scarce resource. WRM also provide advices for the status of water quality and new wellbore locations upon requests and the wellbore drilling permissions.
1. Activities
Water Resources Monitoring
The WRM aims to undertakes various monitoring of water resources in The Kingdom of Tonga include the Tapuhia and Kalaka Waste Facilities.
All monitoring is recorded and analysed for any discrepancies and/or undesirable trends to the resources across Tonga
|
Islands |
No of Villages Underground Wells |
Salinity Monitoring Boreholes |
Tonga Water Board |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Tongatapu |
129 |
18 |
48 |
|
Vavau |
39 |
6 |
8 |
|
Haapai |
6 |
5 |
4 |
|
Eua |
1 |
0 |
2 |
|
Niuatoputapu |
4 |
0 |
0 |
I. SMBs – Monthly monitoring
II. Village underground water – Quarterly Monitoring
2. Source of Supply
Freshwater in the Kingdom of Tonga is sourced mainly from the fresh groundwater lens and rainwater collected from rainwater harvesting systems. Rural villages have their own water supplies and managed by their own Village Water Committees while the Urban Area reticulation system is sourced from the Mataki’eua well field and managed by the Tonga Water Board. The lead agency for water resources management is the Ministry of Lands & Natural Resources.
I. Underground Water Supply are mainly dug and drills wells
Groundwater is normally pumped from drilled wells and some old dug wells with diesel, electricity and solar panel
Wells Pump are Diesel, Electricity and Solar Panel
3. The state of the water resources in the context of natural-based solutions
Water demand
Water use has increased by a factor of 7.9% over the past years and continues to grow steadily. Demanding more Water has recently become the subject of increasing attention, as a result of installing 133 new automated meters in almost every village in Tongatapu to easily calculate the amount of water to pump out from aquifer. Staffs from WRS collect data.
Contamination
WRS Team also monitor Tapuhia Waste Facility bi-annually. They are aiming to evaluate if the quality of groundwater is affected by the operations of the landfill and to ensure that leachate does not pollute the groundwater. Some natural sources of contamination originate from the earth's bedrock, containing minerals such as arsenic or uranium. Human-induced sources include industrial discharges, urban activities, The main problem regarding quality of water in Tonga is increase in salinity due to over pumping water from aquifer.
Laboratory
Various tests are carried out in a laboratory to establish or confirm the diagnosis of a bacterial infection especially for Total Coliform and E-Coli.
