Opinions and voices for change
Navigate the blogs from our experts, water, sanitation and hygiene sector colleagues and guests. Narrow down your search by using the filters.
A question from the floor at a Rockefeller Foundation meeting raised some interesting thoughts about MUS vs MDGs. Read more...
For many decades development aid of western donors has been pretty well shielded from probing questions by the public opinion and politicians. Read more...
This mapping exercise has confirmed that, despite difficulties and statistical constraints, it is feasible to disaggregate the ODA to the water sector from European Union donors into the three component subsectors sanitation & hygiene, water supply and IWRM. And to map aid these flows... Read more...
It is the end/start of the year (depending on the moment at which you read this), so time to look at where one stands. The Joint Monitoring Programme of the United Nations has also done that for the state of the nations of the World with respect to drinking water supplies with this* publication... Read more...
I have argued at times for the need for post-construction support to rural water supply, and so have various publications from IRC and others over the past decade. However, there has been critique to this, stating that there is little evidence that shows that such help helps improving rural water... Read more...
Recently for a number of professional and personal reasons I decided to revisit an old intellectual ‘love’: Appreciative Inquiry ( AI) In the past I experimented with this method in developing a somewhat static knowledge center into a proactive learning and facilitation center, and I remember well... Read more...
Documenting change is a vitally important activity for learning from and improving upon the work carried out in development initiatives. Read more...
Could lack of definition be undermining the impact of effective but costly support? Read more...
One of the pillars of the new Dutch development policy is to promote private sector involvement as a motor for economic growth. Read more...
Change is not linear. Change is not easy. Changing the way research is carried out for more impact is certainly no exception. In session B8 of the Third International Forum for Water and Food, dedicated to innovation platforms, the tone was set: if we want to achieve impact, we have to change... Read more...
In April we interviewed Solomon, Abu, Rabin, Melina and Valerie: five young and bright individuals working together with IRC in supporting 'sector learning' in the WASH sector in their respective countries (Uganda, Ghana, Nepal, Honduras and Burkina Faso). It turns out that ‘making sector learning... Read more...
Significant investments in water and sanitation continue to be made, but it is not clear that these investments have made significant improvements in water and sanitation service levels. Maps are a highly useful tool for visualising data to reveal patterns, trigger action and enable better decision... Read more...
De 2010 à 2011, WaterAid Burkina a conduit un projet pilot d’adaptation des ouvrages d’assainissement aux besoins des personnes vivant avec un handicap. Cette phase a permis de toucher une dizaine de personnes pour qui la vie a changé. Read more...
El periódico 'The Guardian' publicó el otro día un artículo que afirmaba que los proyectos de agua y saneamiento no son lo suficientemente atractivos, y por lo tanto los donantes no están dispuestos a invertir en ellos. Read more...
Grâce au soutien des entreprises Brita, Citroën et également de l'Agence de l'Eau Rhin Meuse et de la Fondation Ensemble, Action contre la Faim a pu renforcer ses programmes au Burkina Faso. Read more...
Malgré une économie florissante et une diplomatie très en vue, le Brésil a du mal à rendre accessible l’assainissement à toutes les couches sociales y compris à Rio de Janeiro, une des plus belles villes du pays. Read more...
Approximately one in three rural water supply systems in developing countries does not function at all or is performing well below its expected level. Failure on this scale represents hundreds of millions of dollars in wasted investment and millions of people who have had to return to fetching... Read more...
“ We just take the programmes as they fall upon us, with their conditions. One donor uses a per capita threshold of 150 US$/capita and wants us to follow one approach, and we will do that. Another uses a threshold of 250 US$/day, but with another approach, and a different degree of community... Read more...
The dissemination of knowledge in a way that is useful and convincing is just as important as producing this knowledge. Read more...
If it is possible to move in a few years from an iPod to an iPhone or and iPad, why are we in the water sector still struggling with the handpump? When can we expect the iPump 2.0? Did Steve Jobs die too early to invent this? As the naked truth about poor levels of functionality of hand pumps... Read more...