Several fallacies exist in the South African agriculture sector regarding the water uses on farms that require government approval, and this often leads to confusion among farmers. In this article, Johan Enslin and SJ Jansen van Rensburg, directors of Integrated Water Use License Application Management, delve deeper into the agriculture-related water uses that require authorisation in terms of Section 21 of the National Water Act (No. 36 of 1998).
A common misconception is that only the abstraction of water from rivers or boreholes on farms needs to be authorised by the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS). However, activities that could potentially pollute water, as well as those that take place within certain ranges of water sources, also require government approval. Nevertheless, a farmer
