The Zambezi River Basin is the largest basin in the Southern African Development Community, and the fourth largest basin in Africa, with a total area of 1.37-million km² (World Bank, 2010). It is shared by eight countries including Angola, Botswana, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The Zambezi River Basin has high transboundary importance in terms of water management. This is not only because of the different contributions of these sub-basins to the overall runoff of the Zambezi River but also because of the very high variability of climate in space and time, the valuable natural resources and major differences in sub-basin characteristics Approximately 41 percent of the basin’s 1.37-million square kilometres spread is in Zambia. (World Bank, 2010).

Report by the African Development Bank