The UN defines access to safe water in terms of “the proportion of the population with access to an adequate amount of safe drinking water located within a convenient distance from the user’s dwelling”.
This certainly seems like a fair place to start. It incorporates quantity (an adequate amount being 20L), quality (safe drinking water indicating an improved source) and proximity (with a convenient distance set at 200m). What’s more, it allows us to quantify access, with the latest statistics for Sub-Saharan Africa standing at 56% for rural provinces and 83% for the region’s cities.
However, there is a danger here. And that danger is that these aggregate statistics can obscure the complexity of what access really means. The emphasis on proximity to a water source ensures that rural Africa will always emerge as the key concern. But, as Satterthwaite (2002) points out, urban dwellers living within 50m of a water pipe often stand as little chance of gaining access to sufficient water resources as rural dwellers who are 20km from their nearest source — “proximity does not mean access”.
In this blog I will delve further into the question of how Africa’s urban population are enabled or constrained from accessing water. I will review various articles on the topic, looking at both trends across the continent and at detailed case studies of individual urban settlements. Following the Water and Development course I intend to take an interdisciplinary approach, discussing not only matters of population density and water pricing regimes, but also the impacts of particular water sources and infrastructures.
In my first entry, due shortly, I will be exploring the contribution made by Thompson et al’s (2001) pivotal study, Drawers of Water II, and what it means for our understanding of water access in urban East Africa.
This certainly seems like a fair place to start. It incorporates quantity (an adequate amount being 20L), quality (safe drinking water indicating an improved source) and proximity (with a convenient distance set at 200m). What’s more, it allows us to quantify access, with the latest statistics for Sub-Saharan Africa standing at 56% for rural provinces and 83% for the region’s cities.
However, there is a danger here. And that danger is that these aggregate statistics can obscure the complexity of what access really means. The emphasis on proximity to a water source ensures that rural Africa will always emerge as the key concern. But, as Satterthwaite (2002) points out, urban dwellers living within 50m of a water pipe often stand as little chance of gaining access to sufficient water resources as rural dwellers who are 20km from their nearest source — “proximity does not mean access”.
In this blog I will delve further into the question of how Africa’s urban population are enabled or constrained from accessing water. I will review various articles on the topic, looking at both trends across the continent and at detailed case studies of individual urban settlements. Following the Water and Development course I intend to take an interdisciplinary approach, discussing not only matters of population density and water pricing regimes, but also the impacts of particular water sources and infrastructures.
In my first entry, due shortly, I will be exploring the contribution made by Thompson et al’s (2001) pivotal study, Drawers of Water II, and what it means for our understanding of water access in urban East Africa.
Great blogs so far, very good critical analysis and reference to the literature you've cited - you've done a very nice move, for example, in blog 2&3 of opening a theoretical debate and then grounding it in the particular case study of Kibera. This is a strong mode of communication for your future paper. It is also interesting to note the reoccuring reference to water vendors in posts 3&4, as well as the references to sanitation and health in 4&5. I like very much that you are linking each progressive post.
ReplyDeleteAs you move forward, it will be helpful to start thinking about these posts in relation to each other. Are they all isolating similar types of challenges to access? Or do they have different perspectives (and perhaps different advocated strategies..?)
Very well done!
Stephanie