Abstract
A study was carried out to assess the quality of groundwater and its suitability for domestic use in Ushewokunze peri-urban Settlement, Harare, Zimbabwe. The study area is not yet serviced with water supply and sanitation. This leaves residents solely dependent on pit latrines for sanitation and on groundwater sources for potable water supply. Ushewokunze is divided into Phase 1; with residential stand sizes of 1 500 m2 - 2000 m2; Phase 2 where stand sizes are from 150 m2 to 250 m2 and Phase 3 where residential stands are of approximately 500 m2 sizes. Seventeen hand-dug shallow wells and the only three existing boreholes in Ushewokunze were selected for sampling. Eighty groundwater samples were collected monthly from January to April 2017, and were analysed, by standards methods, for parameters which included turbidity, Electrical Conductivity, Dissolved Oxygen, chlorides, nitrates, phosphates and faecal coliforms. A water quality index (WQI) was determined. A one sample t-test was performed in SPSS software (v23) at 95% confidence interval, to determine the suitability of the groundwater for drinking purposes. This was done by comparing the mean values of the analysed groundwater parameters with WHO (2011) guidelines and SAZ 560:1997 standards. Spatial variability maps of the measured parameters were prepared by applying the inverse distance weighting method of spatial interpolation with ILWIS 3.3. The obtained results for the means were 6.6 ± 0.33, 10.8 ± 8.4 NTU, 68.7 ± 27 mg/L, 908.6 ± 424 μs/cm, 5.61 ± 1.6 mg/L, 72.07 ± 36 mg/L, 1.14 ± 0.06 mg/L and 77 ± 36 CFU/100 mL for pH, turbidity, chloride, EC, DO, nitrates, phosphates and faecal coliforms, respectively. The Student t-test showed significant differences (p < 0.05) between the means for the following parameters: faecal coliforms, turbidity, chloride and phosphates. The averaged WQI varied from 15.41 to 99.45. The high values of WQI in Phase 2 were suspected to be mainly due to the high values of nitrates and faecal coliforms and varied from 17.2 to 83.5. It was concluded that 90% of the water sources in Ushewokunze were not suitable for drinking purposes. It is recommended that residents should treat all the water from the various sources before use. Residents of Ushewokunze should also be consientised about the poor groundwater quality status in their area.
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