MUS thematic group: www.musgroup.net

Multiple Use Systems (Water for Productive Use)

WSSCC Planning meeting for national coordinators and regional representatives

April 2007

Background - domestic

• The domestic water sector should focus on meeting minimum needs and quality to improve health…some for all

• Productive uses overload domestic water systems… should be banned

• Potable water is too valuable for gardening… should be conserved

• Beneficiaries of productive activities are the rich… lack of equity

Background - irrigation

• Household level productive uses (including livestock) are not the business of the sector…focus on field-scale irrigation

• Irrigation sector should not worry about non-commercial production …valuable cash crops and growth

• Irrigation water is not safe for domestic use …and supplying that is someone else’s problem

Alternative approach

• Small-scale productive uses as a vital contribution to poor people’s livelihoods… wider benefits of domestic and irrigation water

• Water quantity is often the highest priority, and domestic water often not potable anyway… respond to demands

• Incremental costs may be affordable… examine costs and benefits

• Productive uses can be designed for…plan

Multiple use water services

Infrastructure Example Key issues

Irrigation + • water quality for domestic use

Domestic + • water quantity for productive use

• universal coverage

Household level systems/ self-supply

• upscaling of access to sources and technologies

Thematic group

• Operational for 4 years…strengths and weaknesses

• Wider interest and uptake of ideas

• Now at a crossroads

• Should the group be more formalised?

• How to deepen participation?

• How to embed ideas/ activity in other platforms and groups?

What we know

• What do we now know from various research studies?

• Including:– papers at Johannesburg

symposium 2003– AWARD, South Africa– PRODWAT/ MUS group case

studies– MUS project case studies

www.musproject.net – Looking Back evaluation

(Wateraid)– Drawers of Water Study (IIED)

What we know

• People draw multiple benefits from access to small-scale water supplies

• Direct use of water in productive activities…gardening, livestock, agro-processing, micro-enterprises

• Link between improved WASH, health and time-saving and productivity

• The right water supplies can add up to an appreciable impact on livelihoods and poverty

Bushbuckridge, South Africa

• Vegetable gardens, fruit trees, building; brewing, livestock

• Income from productive uses was substantial in these poor villages– averaged $34 per person per year in the ‘worse’ villages – averaged $62 per person per year in the ‘better’ villages

Benefit/cost US$/m3

Gross margin from vegetable gardens and fruit trees

1 to 2

Gross margin from beer brewing 100

Estimated cost of increasing water supply 0.1 – 1.0 (utility)

0.8 – 2.0 (vendors)

Gujarat, India

• Service breakdowns cost women the equivalent of 4 days labour over summer months

• Potential extra income of Rs750-5500 year when collection time reduced from 3 to 1 hour per day

• However, enterprises are about much more than water

What we know

• norms of 50-200 lpcd depending on setting are needed to provide sufficient water for productive uses

• In peri-urban Cochabamba, Bolivia, 50 lpcd for domestic and 62 lpcd for productive uses

• In rural Bushbuckridge, South Africa, 21-22 lpcd for domestic use and of 23-40 lpcd for productive activities

• In Ethiopia, 7 lpcd for domestic and productive use

• Low and inflexible norms-based ‘basic needs’ or rights-based approaches can be a handicap

What we know

• Productive uses may lead to system failure

• Tail-end problems

• May be linked to illegal connections

• Managing productive uses is an important issue in demand management

• Also potential negative impacts on sewerage systems e.g. small towns in Colombia

• Unplanned productive uses leads to inequitable access

What we know

• Potential for improved cost recovery

• E.g. Challacaba case study, Cochabamba

• Financing of water system linked to access of water for diary production in a peri-urban area

• Narrow approaches to water supply that neglect the potential of productive uses are an opportunity missed

Cochabamba, Bolivia

Key ingredients

Appropriate te

chnology a

nd support

Ownership of th

e syste

m: empowerm

ent

Appropriate fin

ancial m

odels

Users improve their capacity and willingness to pay for the service

3

The service is improved reinforcing the needs of users

4 Users utilise water forproductive activities and Improve their economicsituation

2

Users have access to water at low cost and appropriate quantity and quality

1

What we know

• bottom-up, people-centred, and multi-sectoral planning processes tend to facilitate

• Projects fail to address these small-scale productive needs because these uses slip between sub-sectoral remits

Questions

• Is the MUS concept useful in your attempts in improve access to WASH? Why?

• What opportunities/ ideas are there to share lessons, pilot, implement etc in your countries, regions and networks?

Thematic group

• Think tank/ action research/ advocacy and information

• Website, newsletter, award, regular meetings

• www.musgroup.net

• 300 members and a more active core group

Thematic group impacts

• MUS project: examples of advocacy at international and country levels

• Session at 3rd world water forum, Mexico– Wider support from domestic and

irrigation sectors

– Importance of investigating sanitation linkages

• In South Africa, household level productive uses have been recognised in DWAF policy, and guidelines developed

• www.musproject.net

Thematic group impacts

• increase in recognition, across water sub-sectors, for holistic approaches to meeting people’s water needs at household level

• some convergence between sectors

• offers practical support to implementing IWRM

• many positive examples are now emerging

Experiences from implementation at scale

• NGOs– PumpAid– PLAN International

• Governments– South Africa– Colombia

PumpAid

• NGOs like PumpAid are encouraging better access to groundwater

• Government support for rural water supply under strain: coverage up but access down

• Rope and washer pumps are cheap and easy to maintain

PLAN

• PLAN Eastern and southern Africa region have mainstreamed multiple uses of water

• Bringing together fragmented water related interventions in health, food security/nutrition, livelihoods and WATSAN to have more impact

• Examples :– multiple purpose dams in Ghana

designed for irrigation, fisheries and livestock use

– dams in Kenya for livestock, gardening and domestic use

– promotion of drip kits in Zimbabwe for garden irrigation

– boreholes with windmills in Zambia to supply groups of 20-30 families with water for irrigation, livestock and domestic use

Colombia

• The PAAR programme have piloted increasing design criteria from 20 m3 to 30-40 m3 per month per family

• Proposals for changes in rural water supply policy

• How to manage productive uses at household level?

• Tariffs/ cost recovery. Boundary between domestic and commercial.

Strengthening our group

• Coming back to our crossroads….

• Should the group be more formalised?

• How to deepen participation?

• How to embed ideas/ activity in other platforms and groups?

Strengthening our group

• Governance of the group– Currently coordinated by IRC, 9 coordinating

partners, open membership list– Limited funding from IRC will continue for next 5

years

• Welcome new partners and members

• …also funding participation

• Regional/ national groups? Participation

Some key issues

• Promoting more implementation (and learning and sharing lessons)

• Key elements– Financing mechanisms and cost recovery– Micro-credit and enterprise support/ marketing– Sanitation linkages– Learning alliances/ scaling-up

Some new initiatives

• Research Inspired Policy and Practice Learning in Ethiopia and the Nile region (RIPPLE)– Money into water – water into money

• Planned WSP surveys (Colombia, Zimbabwe, Kenya)

• Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation scoping study

• UNICEF Zimbabwe: water and livelihoods

Questions

• Is the MUS concept useful in your attempts in improve access to WASH? Why?

• What opportunities/ ideas are there to share lessons, pilot, implement etc in your countries, regions and networks?