AN ASSESSMENT OF RURAL WATER SUPPLY FACILITIES AND ITS MAINTENANCE MANAGEMENT IN THE BUILSA DISTRICT, GHANA
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- NGN 3000
BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
The availability of clean and sufficient water supplies for household and industrial use has frequently been used as a yardstick for assessing the level of socioeconomic development and health condition of human populations. For the past three decades, clean drinking water has been a priority in development. In 1959, the Twelfth World Health Assembly launched the Community Water Delivery initiative with the goal of increasing water supply in rural communities. By the end of the 1970s, the United Nations (UN) had called for ongoing international efforts to provide clean water and sanitation to all people in poor nations. The provision of safe and adequate water supplies for domestic and industrial use has often been used as a yardstick for determining the level of socio-economic development and health status of human communities. Clean drinking water has been a concern for development thinking for the past three decades. The Twelfth World Health Assembly initiated the Community Water Supply programme in 1959 with the aim of improving the supply of water in rural communities. By the end of the 1970s, the United Nations (UN) called for continued international efforts to bring water and sanitation to all people in developing countries. In November 1980, the UN General Assembly designated the 1980s as the International Drinking Water Supply and Sanitation Decade. During this period, more than a billion and half people were provided with access to safe drinking water and nearly three-quarters of a billion were given access to sanitation (World Bank, 1992b). Many governments and NGOs have strived to provide potable water supply to many communities in developing countries. This is evidenced by the numerous news reports on the commissioning of new water supply facilities (that is, boreholes and wells fitted with hand-pumps) in developing countries. It is said that "water is life" and the level of government commitment to the supply of potable water to as many communities (particularly rural communities) as possible can not be underestimated (Ntow, 1997). In Ghana, the percentage of the rural population with access to safe water at the start of the new millennium (year 2000) stood at 46.4 percent. This figure further increased in 2005 to 51.7 percent (Daily Graphic, 2007). However, the question becomes, how do rural communities build and maintain their communal capacity to generate adequate income and to manage cash flows such that the water supply facility can be self-sustaining? This has led to debates as to whether rural water supply facilities should still be managed by the government or whether they should have a considerable amount of local autonomy (that is, management by beneficiary communities).
Thus, since the 1990s, Community Management has become the acceptable strategy for ensuring sustainable water supply and sanitation schemes. The Community Management Approach (CMA) allocates responsibility for ongoing management of water supply to the community of users. This means that the community, usually by means of a water committee or alternative Community-Based Organization (CBO), is responsible for managing maintenance activities to ensure that the water service continues to operate on a sustainable basis. The process of restructuring and transformation of the water sector in Ghana began with the establishment of the National Rural Water and Sanitation Committee, which was commissioned to look into the sector and come up with solutions or recommendations that would help solve the problems the sector faced at the time (CWSA, 2003). Based on the recommendations of the National Rural Water and Sanitation Conference held at Kokrobite, Accra in May 1991, the Community Water and Sanitation Division (CWSD) was established within the then Ghana Water and Sewerage Corporation in March 1994 (CWSA, 2003). The establishment of the CWSD followed the signing of an agreement between the Government of Ghana (GoG) and the International Development Agency (IDA) of the World Bank, which represented the interests of external development partners. The CWSD became a semi-autonomous entity known as the Community Water and Sanitation Agency (CWSA) after a bill was approved in Parliament in the last quarter of 1998 and president assent was given on 30th December 1998 (CWSA, 2003).
In 2000, the second phase of the National Community Water and Sanitation Project (CWSP-2) was initiated with the support of a World Bank IDA credit of US $21.9 million. The project built on lessons learned from the first Community Water and Sanitation Project (CWSP-1), and adopted a large scale decentralization approach in the planning, implementation, and management of water supply and sanitation (WSS) services in Ghana. The development objective of the CWSP-2 was to increase access and achieve effective and sustained use of improved community WSS services in villages and small towns in Ghana. The CWSP projects were aimed at solving the problem of water scarcity and the sustainability of water supply facilities in rural Ghana. However, after close to fifteen (15) years of the implementation of several management bodies, the issue of managing the maintenance of water supply facilities still remains a problem in rural water provision.
STATEMENT OF PROBLEM
One of the ongoing challenges in Ghanaian rural water delivery is how to assure the long-term viability of water supply systems. Inadequate maintenance financing is one of the key reasons why the majority of rural water projects in developing countries are not sustainable. The Builsa District has 225 boreholes, 46 hand-pump wells, and 218 open wells. The majority of these water sites have been managed by the community. As a result, the community is solely responsible for the operation of the water facility, with little or no help from the District Assembly.To ensure effective community management, the facility implementing agency (usually a donor agency, government or NGO) together with the District Assembly usually selects and trains water and sanitation committees and facility care takers (comprising of a male and female) in each community. However, after several years, the problem of managing the maintenance of these water supply facilities still exists in the region, particularly in the Builsa District. According to the 2003 Community Water and Sanitation Report of the Builsa District, about 43 percent of the hand-pumps and bore holes in the district were either not functioning or recorded a poor performance rate. The consequence is that communities return to the use of their old, unwholesome sources of water whenever there is a break in service from the boreholes and wells. Such conduct negates the health and socio-economic objectives upon which such water projects were executed.Thus, against this backdrop, this study seeks to examine rural water supply facilities and their maintenance management in the Builsa district, Ghana.
OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY
The main objective of the study is to assess the management arrangements for the maintenance of rural water supply facilities in the Builsa District.Specifically, the study seek to:
- Assess the capacity of the institutions involved in the maintenance of rural water supply facilities in the Builsa District.
- Determine the level of community involvement, especially women, in the process of managing the maintenance of the water supply facilities.
- Assess the willingness of communities to pay towards the maintenance of the water supply facilities.
- Examine the funding system as it pertains for the maintenance of the water supply facilities.
RESEARCH QUESTION
- What is the capacity of the institutions available both at the district and community levels for effectively managing the maintenance of water systems?
- What is the level of participation of communities in the management of the maintenance strategies put in place?
- How are communities involved, particularly women, in the planning, designing and implementation, including monitoring and evaluation of management systems for the effective maintenance of the water supply facilities?
- What is the level of community members‟ willingness to pay for the maintenance of the water supply facilities?
- What funding sources are currently employed for the maintenance, and what are the alternative sources of funding available?
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