Tag: sustainability

USAID and Rotary International adopt innovative sustainability monitoring tool

A new sustainability tool for WASH

water services that last

By Harold Lockwood  –

This is great news and fantastic to see USAID adopting and promoting this approach which aims to really track and better understand the underlying causes of poor sustainability in the WASH sector. Sustaining WASH services is complex and dependent not only the hardware (the pumps, latrines and pipes), but also a range of the so-called software elements, for example reliable management entities, long-term external support and monitoring, adequate financing and so on. Measuring coverage is one thing, looking at functionality is also a useful proxy, but if we really want to know where the pinch-points are and how something so seemingly simple as water flowing out of a tap can fall down, it requires a comprehensive and powerful tool.

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Islands of success

Evaluation of a Water For People intervention in partnership with local government India

water services that last

Sagar is an island at the mouth of the river Ganges where it meets the Bay of Bengal. Every year in January, about half a million pilgrims visit the island to worship at the holy Ganges. The hundreds of mobile toilet units standing on the empty festival terrain during the rest of the year are witness to the island’s authority’s efforts to ensure that the pilgrim’s stay on the island is as comfortable, hygienic and safe as possible. But the authorities also don’t forget about the 200.000 permanent inhabitants when it comes to sanitation. Together with the NGO Water For People (WFP) and other partners, it seeks to achieve full coverage in sanitation and water supply in the next few years.

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“A bit more for some” may not be a bad idea

A great report from Stef on the RWSN Management & Support workshop two weeks ago

water services that last

Two weeks ago, the “management and support” working group of the RWSN had its first meeting. This meeting focused specifically on management models and support arrangements for piped water supply in small towns. As rural settlements become bigger, a shift is made from point sources – like boreholes with handpumps – to piped systems. This trend has happened in Latin America and parts of Asia, and is now about to start in Africa and South Asia as well, as argued in the background paper by Marieke Adank. And as there is a shift to piped systems, users may actually want to shift towards higher levels of service. The question is whether that is not a bad idea?

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Looking through GLAAS

by Johan Gély, Swiss Development Cooperation (SDC)

2nd UN-Water GLAAS Evaluation Meeting in Bern 2nd and 3rd October 2012

Background

The UN-Water Global Analysis and Assessment of Sanitation and Drinking-water (GLAAS) monitors the inputs, and processes and their outputs (e.g. policies, investments, human resources) that influence the provision and sustainability of drinking-water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) systems and services.  Following publication of a proof-of-concept report in 2008, GLAAS published two full reports in 2010 and 2012 – the latter covering 74 countries and 24 external support agencies. GLAAS is generally acknowledged as having gained itself a specific niche within the global WASH monitoring landscape.

It is an important tool for the SDC Global program Water initiatives as it is part of an important and logical sequence of work/partnership which combine the global water and sanitation data acquisition (Joint Monitoring Program – JMP), the data analyze/assessment (GLAAS) and the sector global advocacy (Sanitation and Water for All – SWA).

Meeting Outcomes

1) It is a low cost and high quality global monitoring product and process.
2) It allows us to unify forces to lobby for a water goal in the Post 2015 goals.
3) Water Quality should be included in the future water goals and reported by JMP and GLAAS.
4) We should strengthen alignment with national monitoring systems.
5) We need to improve link with others global, regional and national monitoring systems.
6) The presence of new actors (from emerging states) should be reinforced in the future.

Documents

UN-Water GLAAS 2012 report – Approach and Main findings

UN-Water GLAAS – A brief history and rationale 

For further information on GLAAS, please contact Bruce Gordon or Johan Gély.

Don’t shoot the messenger, but embrace the sad stats

water services that last

Driven amongst others by the mobile phone applications, more and more statistics are becoming available on the state of water services. These go well beyond the coverage data we were used to in the JMP reports (and which this year gave us some reason to be mildly optimistic). The new stats provide more insight into the functionality of infrastructure and the level of service being provided. And these are saddening. Just have a glimpse at the overview of these sad stats made by Improve International. Though the specific figures differ from one country to another, but the order of magnitude of non-functional water points is around 30%, with another 10-20% being partial functional. Of the ones that are functional only a small percentage provides services that meet standards. Going a level deeper, one can find more details, such as the percentage of water committees that perform according to…

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Why physical unique identifiers on water points will improve sustainable services

This blog is by Susan Davis, executive director of Improve International, an organization focused on promoting and facilitating independent evaluations of WASH programs to help the sector improve. She has more than 13 years of experience in international development and has evaluated WASH and other programs in 16 developing countries. Her first career (8 years in environmental consulting) involved projects like combining databases across the 10 US Environmental Protection Agency Regional offices, which is where her respect for unique identifiers was born. 

What is a unique identifier?

You probably don’t think of it, but you use unique identifiers every day. In the US, your social security number is your unique identifier for the government (which is why if someone has it they can steal your identity).  Your bank account number helps the bank track all information associated with you.

What is a physical unique identifier?

Well, your house has one – in the form of an address.  Your car has one – the vehicle identification number. The license plate might count but it is too easily removed.  My dog has an identification chip embedded between her shoulder blades because her license tag could easily come off with her collar.  A physical unique identifier needs to be permanent – long lasting in tough conditions, and not easily removed.
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