Increasing Sustainability of Water and Sanitation

Despite the urgent need for adequate water and sanitation services in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), there are significant challenges in constructing development projects which provide sustainable solutions to existing problems. This post is going to describe these challenges and explore how they can be overcome.

Continuing on from last week, the first component of sustainability is effective community demand. The challenge with this is that despite the need for water and sanitation facilities being universal, the understanding of local demand for such needs is not well-known because documentation is limited. Facilitation processes are hindered due to a lack of physical and technical infrastructure in SSA communities. The second component is local financing and cost recovery. The lack of financial services poses a significant challenge. Often it discourages community members from partaking in water and sanitation activities. The third component is dynamic operation and maintenance (Montgomery et al., 2009). Unreliable and inefficient services can be a result of inadequate monetary awareness and planning and a distinct absence of accessible replacement parts or technical expertise (Hutton and Bartram, 2008).

Breaching the Barriers

Improving both access and sustainability of water and sanitation facilities in SSA is a difficult task that requires development practitioners, engineers, and policymakers to work together to assist communities in achieving their goals. In their paper, Montgomery et al. (2009) identify four steps which can be taken to overcome the challenges to establishing sustainability:

1. Improving communication-idea transfer and stimulating behavior change – local priorities ought to be understood through demand assessments;
2. Increasing access to capital and financial sustainability – making use of alternative means of borrowing and managing financial resources can assist communities in overcoming financial barriers;
3. Establishing dynamic operation and maintenance practices – community members should play an important role in developing and enforcing an operation and maintenance plan; and
4. Call for assessing sustainability in water and sanitation services – assessment of use is important to global aims and determining success of projects.

Headway towards realising and ideally exceeding the water and sanitation targets set out in the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) requires those involved in improving the situation of access in SSA to alter their concentration from focusing solely on increasing infrastructure to focusing on attaining long-term practicality aims through improving operation and maintenance of existing systems.

SDG 6. Source: United Nations

The basic components of sustainability arguably provide a structure for involved actors to organise and apply water and sanitation enterprises. If the African population were to be equipped with the means to effectively and efficiently support water and sanitation systems, the outcome would be one of improved economic, health, and educational benefits. Montgomery et al. (2009) go as far as to suggest it would provide ‘future generations of Africans with a realistic opportunity to escape the devastating cycle of poverty.’

This blog has identified and critically assessed a number of possible solutions to development challenges regarding access and use of water and sanitation in SSA. There has been a focus on the urban and the challenges it faces, looking at case studies in Dar es Salaam (Tanzania), Nairobi (Kenya), and Dakar (Senegal), among others. While the rapid growth of urban populations has amplified the demand for safe water and sanitation facilities, it is impossible for me to say whether this age has brought with it solutions which quash the tension between our growing needs and what the planet can provide.

Sustainability of Water and Sanitation

Today, many in developed countries take water and sanitation for granted, while many others in developing countries across the globe are deprived of this basic human right. The impacts of this on human populations are significant, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), where access to safe and secure water and sanitation services is often limited. The impacts are so extensive that, according to Montgomery et al. (2009), a ‘lack of universal access to water and sanitation results in well over a million preventable deaths each year.’

However, among the most significant measures to enhance a population’s well-being and health, increase economic prosperity, and decrease high rates of rural and urban poverty is to increase the provision and use of safe water and sanitation services, so far as to say that it is universal. Sustainable development goal (SDG) 6, as formulated by the United Nations, even suggests that access to safe water and sanitation services are two prerequisites for communities to thrive.

So often, however, these vital services do not exist or fail or cater for everybody’s needs. The challenge that remains for actors involved in improving the situation of access to safe water and sanitation services, in countries where provision and use is limited, is to combine efforts to ‘make pro-poor [water and] sanitation a reality and interdisciplinarity the norm’ (Paterson et al., 2007). Together, there is a greater possibility that the critical need for sustainability in both water and sanitation sectors will be met.

Sustainability as a Pragmatic Concept

Sustainability can be defined as ‘whether or not something continues to work over time’ (Carter et al., 1999). With a specific regard to water, sustainability is whether:

1. Water continues to be abstracted at the same rate and quality as when the supply system was designed;
2. The excreta and wastewater disposal systems continue to function and be used as planned; and
3. Environmental quality continues to improve.

The problem in developing countries is that these systems fail to continue to work over time. They are unsustainable. According to Carter et al. (1999), the ‘sustainability of community water supply and sanitation systems involves a chain of four essential links, the failure of any one of which endangers the entire enterprise.’

Sustainability chain. Source: Carter et al. (1999)

Community members might not utilise the improved source of water because the taste might be unfamiliar or there might be a further distance to travel to collect safe water compared to unimproved sources. If there is no community motivation to use the facilities, then sustainability is unmanageable. The second element in the sustainability chain is maintenance. This is a fundamental component, because both water and sanitation systems will become unusable without it. Next in the chain is cost-recovery. Funding for projects should ideally be determined by communities, as they can select a viable technology to improve access to safe water and sanitation facilities. The last element in the sustainability chain is continuing support. The sustainability of both water and sanitation systems in the long-term will be determined by the level of input by local municipalities or non-governmental organisations, as community enthusiasm for projects can begin to fade after two or three years (Carter et al., 1999).

Elements of Sustainability

In their perspective paper, Montgomery et al. (2009) uncover the most important elements of sustainability in both sectors, in order to extract the primary obstacles in meeting these elements, to then comment on the most viable resolutions for disabling and overcoming obstacles within a Sub-Saharan Africa context. Together, they identified and presented three main elements from existing literature that are fundamental to greater sustainability, which include:

1. Effective community demand;
2. Local financing and cost recovery; and
3. Dynamic operation and maintenance.

The basic premise is that the presence of these three elements increases the likelihood of a community gaining a functioning water and sanitation supply for the long-term, while the neglect of these three elements undermines sustainability.

According to Montgomery et al. (2009), ‘effective community demand is the foundation for understanding and prioritizing community and household water and sanitation needs.’ The scholars argue that a demand-responsive approach results in a system founded on the wants of the community members, their financial budget, and what they can sustain. The reason for why they have prioritised demand-responsive approaches over supply-driven approaches is because the latter is often associated with a lack of funds, financial and operational mismanagement, and inequality as it often benefits wealthier community members.

Local financing and cost recovery, as the second element fundamental to greater sustainability, ‘refers to local access to capital and savings’ (Montgomery et al., 2009). Until recently, water and sanitation problems have not often been included in local investment programmes. Lately, however, we have witnessed greater levels of local financing of projects that permit more tolerant repayments schedules, allow for non-monetary forms of repayment (including labour and supplies), and increase business development in rural areas (Fonseca et al., 2007).

Dynamic operation and maintenance, as the third element fundamental to greater sustainability, relates to the level of performance which allows for adjustments and alterations (Montgomery et al., 2009). This element, according to Harvey and Reed (2007), is based on determining certain duties and 'responsibilities that may be held by the community, an external provider, or through a collaborative arrangement.'

Three elements of sustainability. Source: Montgomery et al. (2009)

The next and final blog in this series of posts on water and sanitation in the Sub-Saharan African context will describe the challenges in establishing these elements of sustainability in order to go on to explore how these obstacles can be overcome.

Burdensome Access to Water and Sanitation

Some of you might be wondering why this blog is named Realising African Rights. To overturn this query, I will outline the reasons why in this post. Then, to pre-emptively quash any concerns about the legitimacy of my claim, I will support it with a range of examples.

The right to safe water and sanitation facilities has been embraced whole-heartedly by international organisations as nothing less than a basic human right. The United Nations, in particular, has adopted this term time and time again, using it to illustrate its position on access to water and sanitation. Yet, in accordance with Sultana and Loftus (2012), ‘how such universal calls for a right to water are understood, negotiated, experienced and struggled over remain key challenges.’

In other words, despite the fact international organisations, governments and quasi-governmental institutions, non-governmental organisations, and other, grassroots organisations, all, repeatedly, demonstrate the fact they understand the miserable situation in regard to water and sanitation, I am of the opinion not everyone is fully aware of the undesirably restrictive access to safe water and sanitation facilities in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

I argue the water and sanitation target in the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) (7.C) was not met because the vast majority of the world’s population did not appreciate or concern themselves with this problem, and the target to ‘ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all’ in the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGS) (Goal 6) is likely to follow a similar path and not be achieved.

Children drink from water pump. Source: Amr Abdallah Dalsh/Reuters

The reason for this claim is based on the fact progress to eliminate the detrimental effects attached to a limited access to safe water and sanitation facilities is slower than the level it should be. The combined efforts of all actors involved in improving the situation of access to safe water and sanitation facilitates should, I suggest, mean headway is much quicker.

The catastrophically large number of child deaths caused by diarrhoeal disease (which many label is a waterborne disease) in SSA is, for example, a persistent problem. It is a problem which has received attention in a variety of policy documents and initiatives, but has not been overcome. Today, according to the WHO (2016), an estimated 1.5 million child deaths per year are caused by the disease.

The time spent collecting water by women and children, as another example of how the situation of access to safe water and sanitation has been neglected by the vast majority of the world’s population, is extremely high in SSA. In fact, according to the WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Report (2015), ‘women and children spend 125 million hours each day collecting water.’ This is time which woman could use to participate in income earning market-based activities. Furthermore, Gayatri Koolwal and Dominique van de Walle (2010) found that ‘both boys’ and girls’ [school] enrolments improve as a result of a reduction in the time needed to collect water.’

Surely, I believe, there are enough socially responsible and conscious individuals on this planet to overcome such harming scenarios in relation to water and sanitation. While this blog has looked into the history of water provision and developmental efforts to overcome unfavourable situations of a limited access to safe water and sanitation in SSA, the next couple of blogs in this series of posts will take a look into the future. It will explore sustainability as a pragmatic concept and the components which compromise sustainable development.

The Unique Case of Dakar, Senegal

Earlier on in this blog I spoke about the implications of rapid urbanisation in Sub-Saharan Africa, and how, on the one hand, it is a process which provides urban spaces with the stimulant they need to grow, yet, on the other hand, it is a phenomenon which inflicts significant challenges for the development of improved safe water sources and sanitation facilities. Now, as this blog has developed, I want to inform this debate by providing an in-depth example of how rapid population growth in an urban area can exaggerate problems of access to safe water and sanitation facilities.

This post is going to look at the anthropic pressure put on water resources in the region of Dakar, Senegal. The city of Dakar is the capital of Senegal, and is the most populated area in the country. The unregulated growth of the coastal population in recent years has exaggerated problems of access to safe water and sanitation services, becoming a major source of concern for both water supply and quality control (Re et al., 2010).

The public supply of water in the region of Dakar is derived from a combination of sources, including groundwater and water piped from the Senegal River (Figure 1). However, an assortment of challenges is preventing the effective supply of safe water and sanitation services in the city and region. The most stressing issue revolves around the contamination of groundwater sources.

An outflow pipe in the city of Dakar, Senegal. Source: Getty Images

Contrary to many other regions within Africa, where groundwater has been labelled as a viable option to increase the supply of safe water (Döll et al., 2012; Taylor et al. 2009), the situation in the Dakar region is much different. In countless cities and regions across Africa, groundwater is in abundance, it is relatively clean and does not require any chemical treatment, and, according to Taylor et al. (2013), might grow in supply irrespective of the driving forces of climate change. In Dakar, there are numerous issues with their groundwater source, relating mainly to its quality.

In 2002, an early warning bulletin on groundwater quality for Dakar was released by the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP, 2002). This report highlighted the fact that the aquifers in Dakar were beginning to become contaminated beyond an acceptable level, stating: ‘Widespread contamination of the aquifer by nitrates is imminent.’ However, in 2016, the situation has only worsened (Richard Taylor, UCL Geography Lecture, 2016). This is partially down to contamination from faecal matter and partially attributable to the intrusion of salt water due to Dakar’s coastal location and high water table.

This makes me question the applicability of groundwater stores as one of the main supplies of drinking water for the population of Dakar. Luckily, the authorities have had similar provisions. In recent years, members working with France’s Eranove subsidiary (Senegalaise des Eaux) have been looking into the provision of desalination plants to provide clean and abundant water. The development of a desalination plant in Dakar will, supposedly, provide an additional 100,000 cubic meters of water per day (CR 2014). However, this approach to increase the provision of fresh water is still very expensive. Current methods of desalination still require lots of energy. Perhaps a more viable approach would be to re-construct and extend wastewater networks so that groundwater is not contaminated in the first place.

The city of Dakar is a classic example of poor water supply and management. Regardless of the (questionably) innovative management agendas affecting Dakar, more needs to be done to improve the situation off access to safe water and sanitation facilities.

PHAST: A Participatory Approach to Development

A theme which has been touched upon on numerous occasions in this blog is that of participatory development; a concept which has arisen out of the increasing contestability of the term ‘development’ (Willis, 2005). Participatory approaches to development, as a reminder to those whom have not touched upon this subject in great detail, have been born out of a distaste with “top-down” approaches. They are “bottom-up” solutions in a development context, which are characterised by indigenous knowledge, the empowerment of marginalised individuals, and, clearly, community participation, which, together, give power to local actors (Briggs, 2005).

One particular example of this kind of bottom-up approach to a development problem can come from PHAST, which is an abbreviation for Participatory Hygiene and Sanitation Transformation. The approach is clearly defined in the WSSCC 2009 Annual Report:

The approach is a participatory learning methodology that seeks to help communities improve hygiene behaviours, reduce diarrhoeal disease and encourage effective community management of water and sanitation services.

This is an approach which has an objective to empower small-scale, local communities to improve their hygiene behaviours by promoting community-management of both water and sanitation services. The goal is to improve the general health of the targeted populations by reducing and eventually preventing the spread of diarrhoeal diseases. PHAST encourages community learning and planning through the application of a seven step process (Lienert, 2011), introduced from the World Health Organisation (1998) (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: Seven steps to community planning for the prevention of diarrhoeal disease. Source: WHO (1998)

The seven-step process is applicable to a wide-range of communities which are attempting to enhance their overall hygiene behaviours and sanitation facilities. There are many advantages to such a participatory approach, including the fact community members can: gain the ability and confidence to undertake their own projects, meaning their voices are heard; have an effective involvement in the workings of the community through monitoring and evaluating the implemented services; and be trained in participatory techniques to become a lasting asset to the community.

Nevertheless, the development of such a process can be quite burdensome. There are some standout disadvantages in regard to the PHAST initiative, including the fact: training requires a vast number of man-hours to conduct in-depth training of community members, which also has implications on the budget; training does not mean community members will end up being equipped with the appropriate skills to assist community projects; the initiative requires a well-structured management structure; and it is relatively time-intensive.

All-in-all, participatory approaches to development provide a valuable alternative to “top-down” initiatives. The PHAST approach, as an in-depth example, offers many advantages compared to market-based or "top-down" approaches.