Tag: Ethiopia

Strengthening accountability for water

This blog is based on the Accountability for Water action and research programme funded by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and managed by the Partnership For African Social and Governance Research (PASGR), supported by Water Witness International, KEWASNET and Shahidi Wa Maji. The full webinar summary is available here.

On 15th December 2022, a global webinar was held to discuss the critical importance of accountability for water. During the webinar, a partnership of organizations led by PASGR and Water Witness presented the findings of their Accountability for Water research program, which aimed to identify specific actions to strengthen accountability in different contexts. The programme partners involved in the research include KEWASNET, Shahidi Wa Maji, WaterAid, Water Integrity Network, End Water Poverty, IRC, and World Bank. Dr Pauline Ngimwa and Dr Muthio Nzau of PASGR introduced the webinar.

Dr Tim Brewer of Water Witness gave an overview of the research programme which started with the global review of evidence carried out in 2019-2020.  According to this review, 80% of the research papers on accountability found that interventions contributed to improved water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services and water resource management (WRM). Common lessons emerged with clear recommendations for action by governments, civil society, donors and others. While a key lesson is that accountability is context specific, an analytical framework based on the “5 Rs of accountability” can be used to identify specific challenges and opportunities within this framework – the ability to review, explain, and report performance against rules, responsibilities, and obligations, and to react constructively to improve performance through sanctions, incentives, or corrective measures.

The review identified a series of knowledge gaps and questions, including gender, donors, government responsiveness, measurement, and civic space. Based on this analysis, 14 Professional Research Fellows (PRF) working in the water sector in Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, Liberia, and Zimbabwe from a range of government, civil society and academic institutions investigated accountability issues in their own contexts. The full list of research topics and researchers is at the bottom of this blog.

The following key takeaways for governments, civil society organizations (CSOs), and donors were drawn from a compilation of recommendations from the research projects .Presenters included Dr Firehiwot Sintayehu (Addis Ababa University);  Eunice Kivuva (CESPAD); Chitimbwa Chifunda (WaterAid Zambia), The full list of research topics and researchers at the end of this blog demonstrates the depth and breadth of evidence underlying these recommendations .

Three key takeaways for governments      

  1. Laws, policies and accountability mechanisms are essential to support accountability. However, lack of clarity and consistency between sectors and levels, a lack of knowledge and capacity about the laws and mechanisms, and weak enforcement often undermine these. Therefore, the key recommendations are to: 
    • Harmonise, strengthen, and execute laws and policies for water resources and WASH at national and subnational levels,
    • Strengthen accountability systems and relationships:  mechanisms, standards, regulation, monitoring, stakeholder engagement and enforcement including for the private sector,
    • Build capacity on accountability, develop an accountable outlook and de-politicise accountability systems.
  2. Clear roles and responsibilities and better coordination: Accountability mechanisms are often let down by poor coordination, unclear or conflicting roles and responsibilities and widespread lack of enforcement. Key actions required are to:
    • Clarify institutional roles and responsibilities between actors for WASH and WRM – eliminate conflicts in functions,
    • Separate implementation and regulatory institutions,
    • Strengthen horizontal and vertical institutional and sector coordination across water users through enforceable accountability systems and mechanisms.
  3. Informed engagement with citizens and users: All the researchers found that effective engagement with citizens, citizen groups and water users is essential for accountability but wanting. To address this governments need to:
    • Introduce or strengthen accountability mechanisms such as public hearings and citizen oversight panels,
    • Provide Information, education, and mobilisation for communities ensure access for marginalised groups,
    • Support civil society to vertically integrate social accountability initiatives into decision making at different levels,
    • Support coordination amongst actors to increase the capacity of rural women and marginalised communities to participate in problem analyses and decision-making processes.

Three key takeaways for civil society,

  1. Activate and institutionalise effective citizen oversight mechanisms.  As well as the government actions to strengthen engagement with citizens and water users Civil society organisations need to support this, they should:
    • Advocate for more legally institutionalised avenues of citizen oversight,
    • Ensure that citizens’ monitoring and advocacy initiatives are vertically and strategically integrated in decision making at all levels,
    • Carry out budget tracking throughout the whole cycle from planning to expenditure.
  2. Build capacity, empowerment and organise communities. A very common cause of weak accountability is the low levels of knowledge and capacity of water users about their rights, the laws and responsibilities around water provision and resource management, and how they can use accountability mechanisms. Civil society organisations need to:
    • Build capacity on accountability mechanisms and support their use,
    • Strengthen grassroots user groups and associations to participate in decision making,
    • Support civil society and water users, especially women, to move up the Participation ladder from token participation to active participation,  decision making, and control.
  3. Build on what works, like budget tracking, evidence-based advocacy, litigation. There is growing knowledge about successful strategies for strengthening accountability. This research has helped to strengthen a community of practice on accountability and identify examples that others can learn from. Key lessons for civil society are to:
    • Strike a balance between constructive and critical approaches to advocacy,
    • Bring strong evidence for advocacy,
    • Raise awareness of WASH and WRM issues amongst all stakeholders including citizens, government and development partners.

Four key takeaways for donors and private sector

  1. Support governments and CSOs to strengthen accountability frameworks, monitoring and enforcement. Donors can provide financial and political support for the actions for governments and civil society mentioned above. They need to:
    • Support governments on WASH and WRM accountability actions as above,
    • Support CSO actions as above,
    • Support good governance and democratic space for citizens’ voice. Citizens’ engagement is critical to enhancing accountability,
    • Invest in women’s participation and reaching marginalised people,
    • Strengthen political will for accountability.  Donors can influence government priorities,
    • Invest seriously in sustainability.
  2. Water investments need to go beyond projects. They need to: 
    • Go beyond procedural & financial accountability. For example strengthen basins planning to ensure responsible industrial water use,
    • Support budget tracking through the cycle – budget tracking is an effective tool to improve budget performance,
    • Invest in appropriate technology to support accountable and responsive services, For example digital monitoring of services and water treatment technology to prevent pollution of water resources.
  3. Enhance due diligence. Researchers found examples of very weak accountability in economic uses of water by industrial and agricultural actors. Donors and private investors can help strengthen accountability by requiring:
    • Stronger due diligence of companies in relation to water use,
    • mandatory reporting on water,
    • promoting and enforcing the Polluter pays principle
  4. Be accountable!  Donors are major investors in the water sector but often do not fulfil their commitments. For example in Zambia the WASH sector is 80% funded by Donors but only 29% of that was tracked through the budget.
    • Accountability Mechanisms are needed to enable Governments and CSO to hold Donors accountable for their commitments. 

Discussion and next steps

During the webinar, Sareen Malik from KEWASNET, emphasised the importance of legislation to strengthen accountability mechanisms. NGOs can play an important role to advocate for this and bring stakeholders together in Joint Sector reviews as a critical mechanism for accountability, monitoring and reporting. 

Martin Atela of PASGR reflected on the role of politics in undermining accountability and suggested that political interference can be mitigated by greater clarity on roles and boundaries of ministerial responsibilities. He also emphasized the need to find ways to work with political elites so they see the value in change

Next steps involve joining the community of practice on accountability for water, to continue learning from experience and to advocate for commitments to strengthen accountability.

Research partners are organising an event at the UN Conference on Water 2023: “Where is the accountability”  on Tuesday 21st March, driving a greater emphasis on governance and accountability. This needs to be front and centre of all discussion.

The Research programme is managed by the Partnership for African Social and Governance Research (PASGR) and Water Witness International with financial support from the Hewlett Foundation.

More information about the research is on the website including findings from the global review of evidence, recorded presentations from webinars at World Water Week 2022 in Stockholm, presentations from country specific webinars, and summary briefings of all the research topics. www.accountabilityforwater.org

List of Research topics, Professional Research Fellows and host institutions

Ethiopia

  • Government Dynamics of Accountability in Ethiopia, Mulugeta Gashaw, Water Witness Ethiopia
  • Political Economy Analysis of water governance, Asnake Kefale
  • Risks and opportunities for growth in Ethiopia’s textile and apparel industries,  Esayas Samuel
  • Wastewater management in upstream catchment of ARB, Yosef Abebe, Addis Ababa University and Ministry of Water and Energy
  • Accountability of the One WASH National Programme of Ethiopia, Michael Negash, PSI
  • Towards a sustainable management of faecal sludge: the case of Addis Ababa, Tamene Hailu
  • Alwero Dam governance, Firehiwot Sentayu, Addis Ababa University

Kenya

  • Government Dynamics of Accountability in Kenya, Dr Tiberius Barasa
  • Enhancing coordination for accountability and sustainability in water resources management; a case of Kerio sub-catchment in Baringo rift valley basin. Eunice Kivuva (CESPAD)
  • Kakamega County Water and Sanitation Company, Kenya.  Mary Simiyu, Kakamega Water Service Provider
  • Rural Women and water decisions in Kwale and Kilifi Counties, Felix Brian, KWAHO
  • Strengthening accountability in solid waste management through incentives and penalties in Naivasha, Kenya, Naomi Korir, Sanivation

Tanzania

  • Government Dynamics of Accountability in Tanzania, Dr Opportuna Kweka
  • Assessment of Gender Power Relations and Accountability in Community Based Water Supply Operators in Selected Water Basins of Tanzania, Pitio Ndyeshumba, Institute of Lands
  • Regulatory and Legal Accountability for Water Pollution in Tanzania: The Case of Msimbazi River Basin in Dar es Salaam City, Mwajuma Salum, University of Dar Es Salaam
  • Opportunities and challenges of accountability claiming in Tanzania’s water sector, Dr Parestico Pastory, University of Dodoma

Zambia

  • What makes budget advocacy an effective accountability tool, Bubala Muyove, NGO WASH Forum and Chitimbwa Chifunda, WaterAid Zambia

Zimbabwe

  • Assessing the effectiveness and impact of statutory accountability mechanisms to improve water service provision and catchment management, Mable Murambiwa, Combined Harare Residents Association, Zimbabwe

Liberia

  • Accountability Challenges in The Liberia Water-Supply Sector: LWSC in Robertsport and Kakata, Timothy Kpeh, United Youth for Peace,  Liberia

About the author:  This blog is authored by Louisa Gosling, freelance specialist in accountability, rights and inclusion in WASH, previously working with WaterAid and as chair of RWSN.

Investing in water is just good business sense; the social impact is the bonus

This year we are celebrating 30 years since the Rural Water Supply Network was formally founded. From very technical beginnings as a group of (mostly male) experts – the Handpump Technology Network- we have evolved to be a diverse and vibrant network of over 13,000 people and 100 organisations working on a wide range of topics. Along the way, we have earned a reputation for impartiality, and become a global convener in the rural water sector.

RWSN would not be what it is today without the contributions and tireless efforts of many our members, organisations and people. As part of RWSN’s 30th anniversary celebration, we are running a blog series on rwsn.blog, inviting our friends and experts in the sector to share their thoughts and experiences in the rural water sector.

This is a guest blog by RWSN Member Bethlehem Mengistu, based in Ethiopia.

I joined the water sector after working in the broader development space for several years, largely on gender equality, good governance, human rights and civil society strengthening. I chose the water sector because its direct impact on people’s lives was so vivid. On a lighter note, my ‘Aha!’ moment was when I was able to easily explain my work to my 5-year-old niece which reaffirmed its value as well as the relevance of my career choice. I have learned that the most meaningful choices are easily understood as they are closely linked to serving others and positively impacting lives. Having worked in the water sector for over many years, I have had the opportunity to work with and contributed in various roles- from Senior Advisor, Pan African Manager to Country Director in international NGOs, bilateral/donor organisations, and civil society.

The overarching highlight across these roles is the amazing impact access to water has on communities – women, men, girls and boys. The immediate impacts are often obvious – access to water saves lives; it enables the potential for a life of dignity and health. However, the most exciting impacts are the more subtle social and psychological impacts we often gloss over in our reports because they are difficult to quantify.

I fondly recall my proud moments from my visits to project sites where the return on investment from water resulted in better health, quality education and stronger government institutions. Some of the stories of change and impact still resonate with me; they are reminders that while there is still a lot more work to be done to ensure universal access, a lot of good work has already been registered. I remember meeting a man in a maternal and child health centre, which recently gained access to running water, stating that he was able to attend the birth of his child because he didn’t have to spend time fetching clean water to the birthing ward for the delivery.

Another story that stuck with me was my visit to a Rural Water board, a type of community-run utility, in 2017 in Ethiopia. The scheme was constructed in 1996 with 80 public taps and 143 km of pipeline. The scheme has expanded its service over time and at the time of my visit, it was serving 13 villages, with nearly 4000 domestic connections, and accumulated savings of ETB 3.8m (approximately US$160,000). The project was handed over to the utility several decades ago, it was a time when ‘systems oriented’ programming was lesser known but presents evidence that thinking beyond the immediate gains i.e. access rates, and considering elements that keep the service running are key to sustainable results. This model of water supply management challenged the conventional notion that communities are not able to manage large or complex water supply schemes. The model also conveyed that economies of scale are achievable with a skilled team of staff to effectively run the water scheme supported by robust governance and accountability structures.

But what do these results really mean on the broader narrative of how we (implementers), as well as donors, qualify results and success from water projects? It is essentially about the long game, about re-imagining what qualifies as a successful and transformative water program. Thinking beyond boreholes and pumps onto partnerships that enable government and national leadership, institutional building, lifecycle costing, operation and maintenance, inclusion and equity, and various other aspects. A typical response to this thinking might be: People need water today so why complicate things by talking about complex concepts? Well, the normative approach to project-based investment is not resulting in transformative and sustainable water services! If we are looking to make low service levels and failed water points a narrative of the past, a comprehensive and systemic approach to tackling sustainability is the most viable pathway. 

The challenges during my leadership journey in the water sector were largely linked to the fact that I didn’t have a large pool of female peers to learn from and share challenges with. This required me to cultivate my own ‘sister circle’ which is critical for both professional and personal growth. Like most development sectors issues of intersectionality and localisation are visible in the water sector, diversity in representation especially in leadership and decision-making roles can gain from change. In many of the spaces I was part of during my career I was amongst the few women present in the rooms and the more senior the leadership role, i.e.: Director or Senior Advisor, the fewer the number of women present. This was especially vivid when I was attending sector meetings with government ministries, investors and other stakeholders. Across both public and non-government spaces, it is usually the case that most senior roles are occupied by senior men who have been in their roles for an extended period. While this may add value to institutionalising practices, it has adversely impacted innovation, equality, and inclusivity in policy and practice. This requires a course correction because inclusion and localisation are effective pathways to sustainable outcomes that will get us closer to realising universal access to water. It will be difficult to expect a different result if we are applying the same approach to tackling problems.

Given that diversity and inclusion is a recognizable challenge in our sector useful efforts by RWSN to promote mentorship programs for young professionals and women in water have been quite useful. It is evident that other platforms are also taking the learnings and nuggets to shape similar interventions, including Agenda for Change’s upcoming Women in WASH mentorship program. It also points to the immense value RWSN has had over the years in brokering resources, learnings, and practices amongst sector actors. Over the course of several years, the network has been the go-to for knowledge, resources, and contacts for water practice and practitioners.

Looking forward it is clear that delivering universal access where no one is left behind will require a systems-oriented, innovative and dynamic approach. Collaboration and partnership present opportune avenues for water sector actors to punch above their unilateral weight to achieve collective impact in light of increasingly complex operating spaces. The pandemic has highlighted that water is not only a development target in itself but also, more importantly, an enabler of most other SDG targets. It is observed that communities with high levels of access are resilient to health or environmental shocks. Investing in water is just good business sense, the social impact is the bonus. I expect that going forward the interface of the water sectors with other sectors (health, nutrition, food security) will become increasingly prominent as contexts remain unpredictable. Linked to these emerging factors I appreciate my current role as Global Coordinator for Agenda for Change, a global platform that convenes key water sector actors to collectively tackle notable challenges facing the sector to accelerate sustainable universal access. Over the coming years, I hope to continue to contribute to and influence the sector in a senior global role while championing equality and inclusive approaches for lasting impact.

About the author: Bethlehem is a long-time global WASH expert with a passion for building collaboration, partnerships, and systems approaches. She is currently the Global Coordinator of Agenda for Change. She has over 18 years of experience in the development sector and deep knowledge of African policy, spanning the areas of WASH, gender equality, human rights and governance. Throughout her career, she has provided technical advice to governments, development partners, and technical teams and held multiple leadership roles where she advanced programmatic impact and influence in Ethiopia, and more widely in East Africa and parts of the Asia region.

Did you enjoy this blog? Would you like to share your perspective on the rural water sector  or your story as a rural water professional? We are inviting all RWSN Members to contribute to this 30th anniversary blog series. The best blogs will be selected for publication. Please see the blog guidelines here and contact us (ruralwater[at]skat.ch) for more information. You are also welcome to support RWSN’s work through our online donation facility. Thank you for your support.

Why getting ‘water affordability’ right matters – and how water diaries can be of help

re-posted from REACH

Dr Sonia Hoque, University of Oxford

Having access to 24/7 potable piped water in the comfort of our dwelling is a luxury that many of us take for granted. In the UK, an annual water and sewerage bill of £400 accounts for about 1% of the annual average household income of £40,000. This ‘safely managed’ water service, defined as having access to an improved source within one’s premises, is well within the widely established global affordability threshold of 3-5% of one’s household income. Estimating payments for water as a percentage of households monthly expenditures may adequately reflect ‘affordability’ in contexts where households have connections to piped water systems or rely on paid sources only.

Continue reading “Why getting ‘water affordability’ right matters – and how water diaries can be of help”

Getting to the heart of climate resilient WASH

by Dr John Butterworth, IRC WASH Ethiopia – re-posted with permission

Climate resilient WASH is about new ways of working across the traditional humanitarian and development sectors. We went to one of the harshest spots in Ethiopia, and surely in the world, to find out more.

Photo: An existing water point in Afdera, Afar

Continue reading “Getting to the heart of climate resilient WASH”

The most important stories in rural water supply // Les histoires d’approvisionnement en eau en milieu rural les plus importants

Making water work for women – inspiring stories from around the world

The reality in much of the world today is that collecting water for the home is a job done by women – so gender issues are central to everything we do in rural water supply – self-supply, pump design, borehole siting, tariff collection, water resource management, business models or using ICT to improve service delivery.

In this week’s webinar we have brought together more inspiring stories from Nicaragua, India and the World Bank.  We are taking ‘gender’ from being a tokenistic tick-box to a living, vibrant, practical core of every rural water service.

Join the us next Tuesday 23 May – it an opportunity to have your practical and policy questions answered from world class experts.

 Did you miss Part 1? Don’t worry. You can watch and listen to the inspiring experiences from Burkina Faso, India, Ethiopia and Bangladesh on the RWSN video channel:

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L’eau au service des femmes – des histoires inspirantes

La réalité dans beaucoup d’endroits dans le monde aujourd’hui est que l’approvisionnement en eau pour les besoins domestiques reste un travail porté par les femmes – donc les questions liées au genre sont au coeur de toutes les activités que nous entreprenons dans le secteur de l’eau rurale: auto-approvisionnement, conception des pompes, emplacement des forages, recouvrement des tariffs, gestion des ressources en eau, ou utiliser les TIC pour améliorer les services.

Le webinaire de la semaine permettra d’entendre des histoires intéressantes du Nicaragua, de l’Inde et de la Banque Mondiale. Nous souhaitons passer d’une compréhension de la notion de genre se bornant à cocher une case, pour mettre en avant les aspects vivants, pratiques et essentiels qui font partie de tous les services d’eau ruraux.

Joignez-vous à nous mardi prochain – ce sera l’occasion de poser vos questions sur la pratique et la politique à des experts du domaine.

Vous n’avez pas pu participer à la première partie de ce wébinaire? Vous pouvez écouter des expériences inspirantes du Burkina Faso, de l’Inde, de l’Ethiopie, et du Bangladesh sur la chaine viméo du RWSN:

 

 

#RWSN @ #WWW : the presentations

RWSN co-convened two sessions at last week’s SIWI World Water Week in Stockholm and presentations are available to download:

WASHoholic Anonymous – Confessions of Failure and how to Reform

All presentations: http://programme.worldwaterweek.org/sites/default/files/panzerbeiter_lt_1400.pdf

Build and Run to Last: Advances in Rural Water Services

Continue reading “#RWSN @ #WWW : the presentations”

Water Crisis – Spotlight on Ethiopia’s Boricha district — WaterSan Perspective

Zelalem Genemo in Hawassa Ethiopia June 13, 2016 In Boricha district of Ethiopia, women and children walk up to five hours to collect water from shallow and unprotected ponds which they share with animals. Sometimes water in these ponds is contaminated as rainwater washes wastes from surrounding areas into the sources. Often, children are left […]

via Water Crisis – Spotlight on Ethiopia’s Boricha district — WaterSan Perspective

What’s happening in RWSN?

So this week, Kerstin Danert , Dotun Adekile and Jose Gesti Canuto are in Zambia running a “Procurement, Contract Management and Costing and Pricing of Borehole Projects” course with 40 water sector professionals as part of the RWSN collaboration between Skat and UNICEF on cost effective boreholes.

In Perú, The World Bank and SDC have been running a RWSN side event on rural water supply at this year’s Latinosan conference. This is first of two preparatory meetings (the second will be in Bangkok in May) for the 7th RWSN Forum, which will be 29th Nov – 2 December 2016

The World Bank, IRC, WaterAid and UNICEF will be actively involved in next week’s SWA High Level Meeting of WASH sector Ministers in Addis Ababa helping to make sure that rural water (and indeed sanitation and hygiene) become a high political priorities on government agendas and budgets.

and finally, World Water Day is on 22nd of March, so you have any rural water stories to share, then get in touch.

Funding opportunity – Water Security

Happy New Year!

Let’s start 2016 with a bang:  a call for expressions of interest (EOIs) for ‘Catalyst Grants’ which are commissioned under the REACH programme.

Dr Katrina Charles explains the REACH Catalyst Grant process
Dr Katrina Charles explains the REACH Catalyst Grant process (click picture to see YouTube video)

These Catalyst Grants of between £10,000 and £50,000 each are designed to explore novel approaches to water security and poverty research and policy that complement the core research conducted by the REACH programme. These grants will promote the co-production of effective tools and technologies relevant for and adopted by policy makers, practitioners, civil society organisations and enterprise.

There are three themes for this call:

  1. Water security for vulnerable people
  2. Water security risk science
  3. Water security partnerships.

Continue reading “Funding opportunity – Water Security”

How to make Self–supply more tangible?

rope pump demo
Rope pump demonstration (A. Olschewski/Skat)

As part of the celebration of the World Water Day 2015 the rural water sector in Ethiopia organized a 3-day event on Self-supply (19th – 21st March) including a trade fair for producers of Self-supply technology and a 2-day seminar with inputs from international and national speakers. The fair hosted more than 20 local suppliers and producers which allowed potential clients to check technologies in detail, to speak to suppliers and compare products for e.g. water lifting, drilling, water treatment.

Suppliers were invited to to market themselves by giving a 3-minutes pitch to the public. A panel of experts gave feedback so that the brave pitchers could improve on their promotion in the future.

In the international seminar on 20th March, experiences from other countries on accelerating Self-supply were shared as well as the information on steps taken so far to roll out Self-supply in Ethiopia including linkages to small scale agriculture and the multiple use concept.

WHO presented results from various studies on water quality analysis of samples from improved and unimproved sources.It became obvious that the concept of improved/unimproved sources is not good for indicator of safe water supply. This perception was so far one of the key challenges addressed to accept Self-supply.

In the future WHO recommends enforcing its concept of Water Safety Plans and clearly promoted household water treatment for any water used for drinking water in rural areas. The Ethiopian water sector will develop ideas on how to establish and follow up water safety plans in Ethiopia which fit to the Self-supply context.

To attract more people similar fairs are planned for other towns in Ethiopia in the near future.

All slides of the international seminar on Self–supply (20th March) and some photos of the fair will be uploaded on the RWSN website.