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As poverty has increased in Zimbabwe and elsewhere in Africa, the importance of water for smallholder agriculture has intensified. This chapter draws attention to the human right to water adopted in General Comment 15 by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, supplanting the Dublin Principles, which have too often been understood in the African context to mean water with the 'right' price. The chapter relates this human rights framework for law and policy, embedded in international and regional African instruments, to the history of national water legislation in Zimbabwe and its recent water reform. We ask how the historically evolving component of 'Primary Water Rights' tallies, or not, with international human rights approaches. It also traces the implications for rural livelihoods of the recently introduced obligation to pay fees for any water use that exceeds these 'primary water uses'. Further, the international human rights approach to water and the national notion of 'primary water uses' are compared with the multiple ways in which men and women share and manage land and water, including local norms and practices within a broader right to livelihood. Field research in Zimbabwe suggests the existence of a right to water and livelihood in local water management that can respond better to poverty and gender inequities. We suggest that a right to livelihood could be used for an active research programme to examine integration of local norms and practices within water management laws and policies and small-scale irrigation as an alternative to the overemphasis upon large-scale commercial agriculture.

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Germination of Acacia auriculiformis A. Cunn. ex Benth. seeds was related to seed development. Full physiological development of seeds, indicated by maximum seed dry weight, was reached 82 days after anthesis; however, maximum percent germination was not reached before day 89. Later, germination declined gradually as dormancy and mortality increased. Most seeds were capable of germination without pretreatment at the time of collection, indicating that seed coats were not impermeable to water. Germination of seeds with moisture content from 14 to 29% can be achieved. Anatomical studies revealed that seeds reached maturity after compressing the parenchyma cells against the inside of the seed coat. The physical properties of the seed coat, therefore, did not control its permeability to water. After the developmental period, seed dormancy increased by further drying of seeds during storage.