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Obert Chifamba Manicaland Bureau
MUTARE City will soon introduce a Geographical Information System (GIS), which will help improve service delivery and increase client satisfaction at a decreased delivery cost, town clerk Mr Joshua Maligwa said recently.

Mr Maligwa said council would be working with GZI, a German non-governmental organisation, as well as the Midlands State University, which is credited with developing the best GIS software, to roll out the programme.

“We have a Memorandum of Understanding with MSU and between now and December we will be working on the modus operandi, tying a few loose ends before we launch the system in January,” he said.

The GSI project is coming on the backdrop of a meeting held between all local governments and Ministry of Local Government, Urban and Rural Development where it was agreed that municipalities should implement the system for improved revenue collection. Kariba, Bulawayo and Gweru carried out the pilot project assisted by GIZ. GIS is the best way to come up with municipal stock.

“The system could help in the maintenance of road and sewer structures,” said Mr Maligwa. “The system can identify a burst pipe underground and notify us, thereby making it easy for us to find a solution quickly. If we respond to burst water and sewer pipes, we can save a lot of money.

“GIS can also assist council to identify zonal metres. Assuming we want to ration water, the system will make it easy for council to identify the zonal valve for that area. We are able to see how much water is being consumed in that area and ration accordingly.” Mr Maligwa said GIS could help them achieve a balance between the water pumped into the system from source, the amount they billed for that water and the actual amount they received from ratepayers.

Council can then see if they have made a profit or loss by making those comparisons, he said.
“Council is able to see all the roads and their state in the city,” said Mr Maligwa. “We can tell if a road is gravelled or tarred and identify the roads that need maintenance urgently.

“It is a critical component in our data base, as it will be able to show us all the stands that are in Mutare and the developments done on them. At the moment we are doing guess work as we don’t really have a fixed number of stands in the city.

“GIS will improve our revenue collection and help us identify water theft incidents as soon as they happen. We can tell where any illegal connections are made and bring the culprits to book. It will also help us regularise those stands that were acquired illegally.”

Mr Maligwa urged all property owners whose stands were not recorded in council data bases to regularise their stands before implementation of the GIS project.

GIS deploys a digital toolbox with a wireless workforce management system. It is a computer-based technology composed of hardware, software and data that is used to capture, display and analyse spatial information. With full implementation of GIS in a local authority set-up, customer requirements will be met systematically on time and within budget and hence client satisfaction will increase at a decreased delivery cost.

GIS creates intuitive water and sewer asset register, which assists in conducting consumer metre audit. It can also perform asset recognition, condition assessment and valuation, allowing customers to self-serve, delivering an improved customer experience, whilst reducing the utility company’s costs to serve.

There also is a significant amount of ‘property’ that is not addressable — underground pipes, overhead cables, telephone boxes, ATMs, road furniture, scrub-land and playing fields. Yet, local authorities need to be aware of all of these in order to plan and deliver their services effectively. This can be addressed by allocating each property or piece of land an individual set of coordinates by which they can be identified.