In Safe Hands?: Water and Sanitation in Africa

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Tippy Tap Water Hack - adapting to 'scarcity' during COVID-19

- December 15, 2020

Tippy Tap Water Hack - adapting to 'scarcity' during COVID-19 Underpinning the WASH challenges in Africa is the concept of water scarcity that many countries face, which refers to over 1000 people competing for a single flow unit of 1,000,000m^3 per year (equivalent to less than 1000m^3/person/year). But this approach to understanding water scarcity is disputed as being dominated by a reductionist, physical evaluation; failing to acknowledge the limitations to the distribution and access to water which is contingent on an array of complex factors including political, economic, and social determinants. Regardless of what metric is used to define the relationship between water and people, the bottom line is that there is indeed inequitable access to clean water across Africa, which thereby compromises their sanitation and hygiene- and is a great threat to public health. The merits of handwashing for public health, for example, has been studied widely over the past decades- pa

"Sanitation is Dignity"… but what about the Dignity of Sanitation Workers?

- December 09, 2020

sourced from: http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/12/human-rights-not-sanitation-workers/ "Sanitation is Dignity"… but what about the Dignity of Sanitation Workers? The saying “water is life, but sanitation is dignity” is widely used in the WASH discourse to draw attention to how overlooked sanitation is in development agendas. But what is even more neglected is the actors that uphold informal sanitation systems. Places like Ougadougou, Burkina Faso, where over 26% of waste is managed with little more than bare hands, highlights how sanitation workers are at the forefront of providing an essential service within densely populated urban communities, where there is an absence of a working sewerage system. Insights from situated Urban Political Ecology (UPE), a geographical subfield that seeks to understand the (re)production of inequalities in urban environment through “an engagement with the everyday that is rooted in local contexts and identities” (Cornea et al.2017: 730) , allo

Happy World Toilet Day!

- November 18, 2020

Happy World Toilet Day! This year, the theme of the annual World Toilet Day was ‘ sustainable solutions and climate change’ , which is becoming increasingly necessary to pay attention to, given the pressing concerns that the global climate crisis imposes. With frequent flooding episodes and drought periods, sanitation systems are under threat (ibid) and in order for communities to remain resilient to the risks of climate change, they must adapt to more sustainable approaches. But before exploring how existing systems can be improved, a closer examination of the current systems is needed, which Naafs (2020) excellently summarises in Figure 1. The diagram identifies what points within the sanitation service chain are vulnerable to climate change: Of the four interactions that Naafs highlights, the ‘need for resource recovery’ at the end of the sanitation chain is particularly interesting to explore in the context of Africa, given the diverse sanitation practices and facilities use

The "Friday Evening Problem": Reflections on Decolonising Knowledge in the African WASH sector

- November 04, 2020

The " Friday Evening Problem" : Reflections on Decolonising Knowledge in the African WASH sector Annually, millions of dollars are splurged by organisations in the Global North on hosting large-scale conferences and events dedicated to ‘sharing knowledge’ and capacity building. But what happens after that? The barriers existing between learning a new approach and actually implementing this within a project has been coined the Monday morning problem , and the study by Results for Development (2014) highlight several avenues for what needs to be done differently. But these suggestions address only the symptoms of a much deeper problem. The reality is that the bureaucratic functioning of Global North actors contrasts the concerns and interests that require attention in Africa, and so obstacles to impactful work arise. But more importantly, Africa’s WASH sector being dominated by actors from the Global North- who often impose their Western knowledge without appreciating the

Sanitation Taboos: Menstrual Hygiene

- October 29, 2020

Sanitation Taboos: Menstrual Hygiene Sanitation is far from homogenous, as Mcfarlane et al. (2014) explores in their paper about how sanitation is produced and sustained in informal settlements. A gendered lens is therefore needed to unveil some of the disparities in “everyday sanitation” that women experience. Women disproportionately bear the difficulties of sanitation inadequacies ( Bapat and Agarwal 2003 ) but are reluctant to discuss their experiences- partly because they deem water access and quality as more important than sanitation (ibid). Although they are intrinsically linked, Curtis et al. (2000) note that improved health outcomes are dependant more on adequate sanitation facilities (such as waste disposal) than water provision; reiterating the importance of sanitation that is often undervalued. But the key factor that underpins why sanitation is overlooked is that is a ‘taboo’ topic across several cultures around the world, including within Africa. It is uncommon for

Safe Water

- October 20, 2020

Safe Water In 2010, the United Nations General Assembly explicitly recognised water and sanitation to be a human right. One aspect that defines this right is that water must be ‘safe’- free from microorganisms and other substances that can threaten one’s health. Chlorine has been used for over a century to disinfect water. It has contributed substantially to the increase in access to safe drinking water for millions of people around the world as it can be incorporated on varying scales- ranging from piped networks in urban areas, to household treatments in rural settings. Chlorination is regarded as the most affordable, reliable and effective method of water purification, especially because of its ability to kill the majority of pathogens responsible for diarrheal diseases in children (GEMS, 2018); thus being an approach endorsed by the WHO to improve water quality (2003). There is a plethora of epidemiology and economics literature that has concluded the wide-reaching benefits

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