The Glow project
The GLOW project aims to provide timely and easy access to current and forecasted water resources information – availability and demand – across an entire water resources system, with a focus on water stored in reservoirs, soils and groundwater bodies.
Furthermore the GLOW project aims to support sustainable development and improving water security in the Maputo and Black Umbuluzi river catchments and delta’s which is the major water supply source for Maputo, a Delta city by implementing the GLOW services including a water availability and demand forecast, alerting and water distribution advisories for two catchments which are critical for the water security of water users upstream (mostly irrigation) and downstream (urban) and environmental use (e.g. downstream delta).
The Partners for Water “GLOW consortium” consisting of HydroLogic, Emanti and FutureWater hosted a GLOW user requirement analysis workshop with the Joint River basin Authority (JRBA), in Eswatini. The session was to identify the user needs of the JRBA and key related stakeholders, based upon which the GLOW system will assists JRBA and stake-holders with inter alia weather forecasting, and seasonal predictions, as well as support communications to inform other processes such as water restrictions, dam filling schedules and policy development. The Value Proposition Approach was used, where different “user personas / user types” were identified by attendees. Thereafter, workshopping captured different Pains (obstacles and challenges), Gains (goals and wishes), Pain Relievers (reduce negative emotions, undesired situations), and Gain Creators (added value) for each persona. Despite the different persona’s covered (ranging from for e.g. a National eSwatini Minister, to local farmers, to dam operators of the JRBA, to CEO of sugar cane business) common user requirements emerged including dashboards and reports, alerts at different time scales (daily, weekly, seasonal etc.), advisory messaging, as well as a shared data repository. Groups also used maps of the project area to identify focus and problem areas. Two additional user requirements workshops are to follow with Ara Sul in Mozambique, and PUCMA in South Africa.
The user requirement workshop at the JRBA
Want to know more about GLOW? Contact Ralf Linneman on: ralf.linneman@hydrologic.com.
