Inner Murchison Bay - water quality trends

Lake Victoria, the second largest freshwater lake in the world, is situated in East Africa, boardered by the countries of Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. A large number of people in these countries depend on the lake as a source of drinking water. In Uganda, National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC) has four raw water intakes on the lake for the urban centres of Kampala, Jinja, and Entebbe. Two of these intakes (Gaba 1 & Gaba 11 for Kampala) are in the Inner Murchison Bay (IMB). Using water quality data (mean monthly values) for the period 1994 – 1998 this study attempted to establish the trends of water quality in the IMB. Core parameters of colour (apparent), electrical conductivity (E.C), turbidity and faecal coliform content were considered. Since NWSC draws raw water from the lake for treatment, water quality data for treated water for the same period were considered with a view to establishing whether change in quality of raw water would affect the resulting quality of treated water. The findings were used to demonstrate the ability of the current water treatment process to produce water of acceptable drinking water standards.