The Fluvial Imagination: On Lesotho's Water-Export Economy (Critical Environments: Nature, Science, and Politics #12)

By: Colin Hoag

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Synopsis: A free open access ebook is available upon publication. Learn more at www.luminosoa.org. Landlocked and surrounded by South Africa on all sides, the mountain kingdom of Lesotho became the world's first "water-exporting country" when it signed a 1986 treaty with its powerful neighbor. An elaborate network of dams and tunnels now carries water to Johannesburg, the subcontinent's water-stressed economic epicenter. Hopes that receipts from water sales could improve Lesotho's fortunes, however, have clashed with fears that soil erosion from overgrazing livestock could fill its reservoirs with sediment. In this wide-ranging and deeply researched book, Colin Hoag shows how producing water commodities incites a fluvial imagination. Engineering water security for urban South Africa draws attention ever further into Lesotho's rural upstream catchments: from reservoirs to the soils and vegetation above them, and even to the social lives of herders at remote livestock posts. As we enter our planet's water-export era, Lesotho exposes the possibilities and perils ahead.

Book Quality:: Publisher Quality
Book Size:: 236 Pages
ISBN-13:: 9780520386358
Related ISBNs:: 9780520386341
Publisher:: University of California Press
Date of Addition:: 11/08/22
Copyrighted By:: Colin Hoag
Adult content:: No
Language:: English
Has Image Descriptions:: No
Categories:: Nonfiction, Outdoors and Nature, Business and Finance, Social Studies, Earth Sciences, Politics and Government
Submitted By:: Bookshare Staff
Usage Restrictions:: This is a copyrighted book.