---
title: According to Oxfam, "in the face of an imminent water shortage, the… — Cape Town · tree and pragmatics
description: According to Oxfam, "in the face of an imminent water shortage, the city of Cape Town in South Africa successfully reduced its water use by more than half in three years, cutting it from 1.2bn litres per day in February 2015 to 516m litres per day in 2018." Who acts: face, water. A sentence of Wikip
---

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# Cape Town, sentence 92

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From Wikipedia, [«Cape Town»](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Town), revision of the 2026-09-01 dump, [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). The trees and pragmatics of these pages, Mova's parse of that text, are CC BY-SA 4.0 too.

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According to Oxfam, "in the face of an imminent water shortage, the city of Cape Town in South Africa successfully reduced its water use by more than half in three years, cutting it from 1.2bn litres per day in February 2015 to 516m litres per day in 2018."

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**Who acts:** face, water · **What happens:** accord, reduce, use, cut · **To what, where:** water, 1.2bn litres · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of the English Wikipedia article «Cape Town». The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (face, water), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong. The article's note marks are left out of the parse.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = wikipedia:Cape_Town:92
# text = According to Oxfam, "in the face of an imminent water shortage, the city of Cape Town in South Africa successfully reduced its water use by more than half in three years, cutting it from 1.2bn litres per day in February 2015 to 516m litres per day in 2018."
1	According	accord	VERB	VBG	ExtPos=ADP|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	3	case	_	_
2	to	to	ADP	IN	_	1	fixed	_	_
3	Oxfam	Oxfam	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
5	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	in	in	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	face	face	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	nsubj	_	_
9	of	of	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
10	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
11	imminent	imminent	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
12	water	water	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	compound	_	_
13	shortage	shortage	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	city	city	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	conj	_	_
17	of	of	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	Cape	Cape	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	19	compound	_	_
19	Town	Town	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	16	nmod	_	_
20	in	in	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	South	South	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	22	compound	_	_
22	Africa	Africa	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	19	nmod	_	_
23	successfully	successfully	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	_
24	reduced	reduce	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
25	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	26	nmod:poss	_	_
26	water	water	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	nsubj	_	_
27	use	use	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	24	ccomp	_	_
28	by	by	ADP	IN	_	31	case	_	_
29	more	more	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp|ExtPos=ADV	31	advmod	_	_
30	than	than	ADP	IN	_	29	fixed	_	_
31	half	half	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing|NumForm=Word|NumType=Frac	27	obl	_	_
32	in	in	ADP	IN	_	34	case	_	_
33	three	three	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	34	nummod	_	_
34	years	year	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	27	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
35	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	36	punct	_	_
36	cutting	cut	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	27	advcl	_	_
37	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	36	obj	_	_
38	from	from	ADP	IN	_	40	case	_	_
39	1.2bn	1.2bn	NUM	CD	NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card	40	nummod	_	_
40	litres	litre	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	36	obl	_	_
41	per	per	ADP	IN	_	42	case	_	_
42	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	40	nmod	_	_
43	in	in	ADP	IN	_	44	case	_	_
44	February	February	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	36	obl	_	_
45	2015	2015	NUM	CD	NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card	44	nmod:unmarked	_	_
46	to	to	ADP	IN	_	48	case	_	_
47	516m	516m	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	48	compound	_	_
48	litres	litre	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	36	obl	_	_
49	per	per	ADP	IN	_	50	case	_	_
50	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	48	nmod	_	_
51	in	in	ADP	IN	_	52	case	_	_
52	2018	2018	NUM	CD	NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card	36	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
53	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	24	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
54	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	24	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **accord** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn future\_having-13.3 «NP V NP.theme (PP)»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **reduce** *in a quote* | past | the face accord to Oxfam of a imminent water shortage and the city of Cape Town in South Africa |  |  |  |  | successfully *property* | vn limit-76 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Causer clause=Goal |
| 3 | **use** *in a quote* | present | shortage's water |  |  |  | year | by half | vn eat-39.1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **cut** *in a quote* | gerund | shortage's water *not said here* | water |  | 1.2bn litres per day | february | to 516m litres per day *result*; in 2018 | vn caused\_calibratable\_cos-45.6.2 «NP V NP.patient PP.extent PP.initial\_state PP.result»: agent=Causer it=Patient from litre=Initial\_State to litre=Result |

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One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

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**Text:** the English Wikipedia, «Cape Town», revision of the 2026-09-01 dump, CC BY-SA 4.0. **Tree:** Mova's own parse, CC BY-SA 4.0 as the text is. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the article read in order, CC BY-SA 4.0.

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