Manzi the mascot educates Strand pupils about water sustainability

The City’s mascot, Manzi, recently visited the Grade 6 pupils at the Lochnershof Primary School in Strand, as part of an edutainment roadshow to help the youth learn about the water programme.

The programme aims to improve the City’s water supply by 300 million litres per day through methods such as water reuse, desalination, and other alternative sources.

The water and sanitation community engagement team has a new curriculum for its edutainment messaging to increase awareness about four priority projects, which aim to increase the City’s water supply from 2030 and beyond: 

•Water re-use: Implementing purified recycled wastewater, adding 70 million to 100 million litres a day.

• Desalination: Extracting salt from seawater to yield between 50 million to 70 million litres a day.
• Clearing of invasive plant species and various management interventions: Harnessing water from rivers to contribute an additional 30 million litres a day.
• Groundwater extraction: Drilling boreholes and tapping springs, securing more than 100 million litres a day.

Since July 2024, 14 schools within the Cape Town metro have enjoyed participating in Manzi’s 45-minute lessons, delivered with song, dance, and interactive games to test knowledge, the City said.

“It is one of our priorities to transfer knowledge about how water reuse and desalination will help safeguard the City against the impact of climate change on water supply. The schools’ roadshow is more than an awareness drive - it’s an investment in the future engineers, homeowners, and policymakers of Cape Town.  

“When the youth understand that every water drop can be purified, reused, and returned safely to tap, they grow into citizens who value water as the scarce, precious, and shared resource that we all need,” said Zahid Badroodien, the mayoral committee member for water and sanitation.