Some Challenges for DEWATS Approaches in South Africa

2010 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathy Eales
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Wastewater Treatment ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Universal Access ◽  
Water Security ◽  
Infrastructure Development ◽  
Water And Sanitation ◽  
Sanitation Services ◽  
Treated Effluent ◽  
Sustainable Services

SA has set bold targets to ensure universal access to water and sanitation by 2014. One consequence of South Africa's comparative wealth is that government has substantial fiscal resources to fund rapid infrastructure development and service upgrading and subsidise a portion of the recurrent costs of water and sanitation services for low income households. More than 70% of the population now has at least a VIP toilet, and about 56% have sewered flush toilets. Government's commitment to improving sanitation services does not yet align with the municipal capacity to run sewered sanitation with centralised wastewater treatment as the default in all urban settlements. Decaying networks, sewer spills and rising levels of wastewater treatment failure are polluting South Africa's water systems and, in time, could compromise national water security in a context of growing scarcity. South Africa urgently needs to find lower cost, less skills-intensive ways of treating wastewater that have a reduced risk of failure and which meet people's need for robust, sustainable services. DEWATS approaches have significant merit. Implementation of DEWATS approaches in South Africa must take account of three main challenges:▪ The willingness of South African municipalities to consider alternatives to conventional sewering and wastewater treatment▪ The nutrient load of the final treated effluent, given the importance of safe-guarding river water quality in a context of growing water scarcity▪ Partnering and co-management dynamics in a context of state-centric supply-side service provision The paper reviews each in the context of a leading innovator in sanitation improvement in South Africa, eThekwini Metro Municipality. In 2010, the Metro will test the technical limits of DEWATS treatment efficacy at a purpose-built research site. The results will inform the utility's decision about whether to proceed with DEWATS from a technical perspective, and if so, how.

Zero subsidy strategies for accelerating access to rural water and sanitation services

2011 ◽  
Vol 63 (5) ◽  
pp. 1037-1043 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter A. Harvey
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Service Provision ◽  
Low Income Countries ◽  
Water And Sanitation ◽  
Sanitation Services ◽  
The Past ◽  
Self Sufficiency ◽  
Rural Water ◽  
Sustainable Services ◽  
One Year

Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS) and Household-Led Water Supply (HLWS) are zero subsidy approaches to water and sanitation service provision that have been recently piloted in Zambia. The increases in access to sanitation and toilet usage levels achieved in one year under CLTS were far greater than any achieved in subsidised programmes of the past. Similarly, HLWS has shown that rural households are willing to invest in their own infrastructure and that they can increase coverage of safe water without external hardware subsidy. The promotion of self-sufficiency rather than dependency is a key component of both approaches, as is the focus on the development of sustainable services rather than the external provision of infrastructure. Zero subsidy strategies have the potential to deliver far more rapid increases in service coverage and higher levels of sustainability than the conventional subsidised approaches that predominate in low-income countries.

Water and sanitation policies for improving health in South Africa: overcoming the institutional legacy of apartheid

Water Policy ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 7 (6) ◽  
pp. 627-642 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edina Sinanovic ◽  
Sandi Mbatsha ◽  
Stephen Gundry ◽  
Jim Wright ◽  
Clas Rehnberg
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Integrated Approach ◽  
The South ◽  
Financing System ◽  
Water And Sanitation ◽  
Sanitation Services ◽  
Sanitation And Hygiene ◽  
Access To Water ◽  
New Policies

The burden of water-related disease is closely related to both the socio-economic situation and public health issues like access to clean water, sanitation and hygiene services. Poverty eradication, through improved access to water and sanitation, is the South African government's major priority. This is partly achieved through subsidising the cost of water and sanitation provision to the poor in rural areas. Whilst the new policies have made a remarkable impact on improved access to water and sanitation services, a general problem since the new approach in 1994 has been the lack of integration of policies for water and sanitation and health. This paper analyses the policies concerning rural water supply and sanitation in South Africa. It considers the structure of institutions, the division of responsibilities and legislated and financial capacity of the South Africa's water sector. A more integrated approach for the policies aiming at water access, sanitation and health is needed. In addition, as the local government's capacity to implement different programmes is limited, a review of the financing system is necessary.

scholarly journals The how tough is WASH framework for assessing the climate resilience of water and sanitation

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Guy Howard ◽  
Anisha Nijhawan ◽  
Adrian Flint ◽  
Manish Baidya ◽  
Maria Pregnolato ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Rural Communities ◽  
Universal Access ◽  
Small Towns ◽  
Water And Sanitation ◽  
Middle Income ◽  
Sanitation Services ◽  
Middle Income Countries ◽  
Measurement Framework ◽  
Low And Middle Income

AbstractClimate change presents a major threat to water and sanitation services. There is an urgent need to understand and improve resilience, particularly in rural communities and small towns in low- and middle-income countries that already struggle to provide universal access to services and face increasing threats from climate change. To date, there is a lack of a simple framework to assess the resilience of water and sanitation services which hinders the development of strategies to improve services. An interdisciplinary team of engineers and environmental and social scientists were brought together to investigate the development of a resilience measurement framework for use in low- and middle-income countries. Six domains of interest were identified based on a literature review, expert opinion, and limited field assessments in two countries. A scoring system using a Likert scale is proposed to assess the resilience of services and allow analysis at local and national levels to support improvements in individual supplies, identifying systematic faults, and support prioritisation for action. This is a simple, multi-dimensional framework for assessing the resilience of rural and small-town water and sanitation services in LMICs. The framework is being further tested in Nepal and Ethiopia and future results will be reported on its application.

Global Goal Setting and the Human Right to Water

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cristy Clark
Keyword(s):  
Goal Setting ◽  
Universal Access ◽  
New Delhi ◽  
Human Right ◽  
Water And Sanitation ◽  
The Sustainable Development ◽  
Sanitation Services ◽  
Human Need ◽  
Global Goal ◽  
Development Goals

Since the 1970s, global goal setting to increase access to safe drinking water has taken a number of different approaches to whether water should be primarily understood as a “human right” or a “human need.” In the Mar del Plata declaration of 1977, states both recognized a human right to water and committed themselves to achieving universal access by 1990. By the 1990 New Delhi Statement, with universal access still out of reach, the goal was renewed with a new deadline of 2000, but water was described as a human need rather than a human right. This approach was coupled with an emphasis on water’s economic values and the need for increased cost recovery, which in turn increased the focus on, and uptake of, private-sector participation in the delivery of water and sanitation services across the Global South. A similar needs-based approach was adopted at the start of the new millennium in Target 7 of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), but during this decade a consensus on the recognition of the human right to water also emerged in international law. As the normative status and content of this right came to be better articulated and understood, it began to influence the practice of providing water and sanitation services, and by the end of the MDG process a rights-based approach featured more prominently in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of 2015. While the provision of water and sanitation services is multifaceted, the evidence of global achievements from the 1970s onward indicates that a rights-based approach increases the priority given to the social values of such services and focuses attention on the need to go beyond technical solutions to address the structural issues at the heart of water inequality. Going forward, approaches to the provision of water and sanitation services and the human right to water will need to continue to adapt to new challenges and to changing conceptualizations of water, including the growing recognition that all living things have a right to water and that water itself can have rights.

Improving access to water supply and sanitation in urban India: microfinance for water and sanitation infrastructure development

2008 ◽  
Vol 58 (4) ◽  
pp. 887-891 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jenna Davis ◽  
Gary White ◽  
Said Damodaron ◽  
Rich Thorsten
Keyword(s):  
Water Supply ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Infrastructure Development ◽  
Sanitation Services ◽  
Poor Households ◽  
Access To Water ◽  
Water And Sanitation Infrastructure ◽  
Sanitation Infrastructure ◽  
The City ◽  
Water Supply And Sanitation

This article summarises initial findings of a study to explore the potential of providing micro-financing for low-income households wishing to invest in improved water supply and sanitation services. Through in-depth interviews with more than 800 households in the city of Hyderabad in India, we conclude that, even if provided with market (not concessional) rates of financing, a substantial proportion of poor households would invest in water and sewer network connections.

Estimating greenhouse gas emissions associated with achieving universal access to electricity for all households in South Africa

2012 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 8-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise Tait ◽  
Harald Winkler
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
South Africa ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Universal Access ◽  
Electricity Demand ◽  
Power Stations ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Minor Portion ◽  
A Minor ◽  
Electricity Access

Climate change, energy security and achieving universal electricity access for all households are all pressing issues that South Africa must address. These objectives need not be trade-offs, however, and achieving electricity access for the poor does not justify the building of large coal-fired power stations or threaten South Africa’s climate change objectives. This paper estimates the electricity demand from the residential sector to 2020 resulting from universal access, and finds that electricity for low-income households would constitute only a small addition to total electricity demand and would represent only a minor portion of output from the coal-fired power station, Medupi. Furthermore, emissions from the additional electricity consumed by newly connected households would have a negligible impact on South Africa’s emissions profile.

scholarly journals Determinants in implementing a public policy for an essential volume of free water in Bogotá and Medellín, Colombia

2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 719-730 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Vargas ◽  
Léo Heller
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Relevant Literature ◽  
Free Water ◽  
National Guidelines ◽  
Human Right ◽  
Water And Sanitation ◽  
Sanitation Services ◽  
Access To Water ◽  
User Groups

Abstract Within the framework for the realization of the human right to water and sanitation, States have the obligation to implement programs and public policies that satisfy the basic needs of their population, especially its most vulnerable demographics. In Colombia, this challenge has been addressed through policies that provide a determined essential amount of free water to people whose access to water and sanitation services are limited due to low income. Through a review of legal and technical documents as well as relevant literature, this article presents an analysis of the particular determinants involved in implementing this program in Bogotá and Medellín, as well as some related concerns. Among such factors, we discuss the evolution and changes of the tariff model used in service provision, estimates of basic consumption, the role of social movements and collective action, and user disconnection due to non-payment. The main particularities and differences of each case highlighted the inconveniences related to the method of identifying eligible users and applying assistance to beneficiary user groups, and the need for national guidelines in implementing this policy.

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