Invitation: World Heritage Site, Lake St Lucia, is about to undergo an ecosystem flip

Environmental journalists are invited to a seminar by Professor Alan Whitfield, Emeritus Chief Scientist at the South African Institute for Aquatic Biodiversity (NRF-SAIAB), a facility of the National Research Foundation, titled “World Heritage Site, Lake St Lucia, is about to undergo an ecosystem flip” on 23 September 2026 at the NRF-SAIAB Lecture Room in Makhanda, Eastern Cape. The seminar will also be available virtually via Microsoft Teams.

The St Lucia estuarine system, one of Africa’s largest estuarine lakes located in northern KwaZulu-Natal and a core feature of the iSimangaliso World Heritage Site, is changing. In its present state, due to its shallowness and intermittent connectivity to the sea, it is prone to large fluctuations in salinity and water level – but now this is all changing. An analysis of recent monitoring data has provided clear evidence that St Lucia is at a ‘tipping point’, with the system about to change forever into a freshwater wetland. This progression has been speeded up by human-caused increases in sedimentation. The stark reality is that soon St Lucia will no longer be able function as an estuarine system and South Africa will have lost half of all its estuarine habitat. This presentation will explore the causes of the loss of connectivity between the lake and the sea and examine options for the way forward.

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