Richard Carter weaves together the myriad of factors that need to come together to make rural water supply truly available to everyone. He concludes that ultimately, systemic change to the global web of injustice that divides this world into rich and poor may be the only way to address the underlying problem.
A Bucket of Water reflects on the work of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) in tackling challenging issues in rural development, and provides an accessible discussion of themes such as peace and development, the cost of inaction, engaging young people in farming, women's contribution, business, and technology and research.
Rural Water Systems for Multiple Uses and Livelihood Security covers the technological, institutional, and policy choices for building rural water supply systems that are sustainable from physical, economic, and ecological points-of-view in developing countries. While there is abundant theoretical discourse on designing village water supply schemes as multiple use systems, there is too little understanding of the type of water needs in rural households, how they vary across socio-economic and climatic settings, the extent to which these needs are met by the existing single use water supply schemes, and what mechanisms exist to take care of unmet demands. The case studies presented in the book from different agro ecological regions quantify these benefits under different agro ecological settings, also examining the economic and environmental trade-offs in maximizing benefits. This book demonstrates how various physical and socio-economic processes alter the hydrology of tanks in rural settings, thereby affecting their performance, also including quantitative criteria that can be used to select tanks suitable for rehabilitation. - Covers interdisciplinary topics deftly interwoven in the rural context of varying geo-climatic and socioeconomic situations of people in developing areas - Presents methodologies for quantifying the multiple water use benefits from wetlands and case studies from different agro ecologies using these methodologies to help frame appropriate policies - Provides analysis of the climatic and socioeconomic factors responsible for changes in hydrology of multiple use wetlands in order to help target multiple use water bodies for rehabilitation - Includes implementable models for converting single use water supply systems into multiple use systems
The most acute water crises occur in everyday contexts in impoverished rural and urban areas across the Global South. While they rarely make headlines, these crises, characterized by inequitable access to sufficient and clean water, affect over one billion people globally. What is less known, though, is that millions of these same global citizens are at the forefront of responding to the challenges of water privatization, climate change, deforestation, mega-hydraulic projects, and other threats to accessing water as a critical resource. In Transforming Rural Water Governance Sarah T. Romano explains the bottom-up development and political impact of community-based water and sanitation committees (CAPS) in Nicaragua. Romano traces the evolution of CAPS from rural resource management associations into a national political force through grassroots organizing and strategic alliances. Resource management and service provision is inherently political: charging residents fees for service, determining rules for household water shutoffs and reconnections, and negotiating access to water sources with local property owners constitute just a few of the highly political endeavors resource management associations like CAPS undertake as part of their day-to-day work in their communities. Yet, for decades in Nicaragua, this local work did not reflect political activism. In the mid-2000s CAPS’ collective push for social change propelled them onto a national stage and into new roles as they demanded recognition from the government. Romano argues that the transformation of Nicaragua’s CAPS into political actors is a promising example of the pursuit of sustainable and equitable water governance, particularly in Latin America. Transforming Rural Water Governance demonstrates that when activism informs public policy processes, the outcome is more inclusive governance and the potential for greater social and environmental justice.
The supply of reliable and safe water is a key challenge for developing countries, particularly India. Community management has long been the declared model for rural water supply and is recognised to be critical for its implementation and success. Based on 20 detailed successful case studies from across India, this book outlines future rural water supply approaches for all lower-income countries as they start to follow India on the economic growth (and subsequent service levels) transition. The case studies cover state-level wealth varying from US$2,600 to US$10,000 GDP per person and a mix of gravity flow, single village and multi-village groundwater and surface water schemes. The research reported covers 17 states and surveys of 2,400 households. Together, they provide a spread of cases directly relevant to policy-makers in lower-income economies planning to upgrade the quality and sustainability of rural water supply to meet the Sustainable Development Goals, particularly in the context of economic growth.
This book offers insights into ways countries and individual organisations can move towards a service delivery approach and is a valuable resource for professionals in who are interested in improving the design and implementation of rural water supply programmes. Published in association with IRC.
Rural–Urban Water Struggles compiles diverse analyses of rural–urban water connections, discourses, identities and struggles evolving in the context of urbanization around the world. Departing from an understanding of urbanization as a process of constant making and remaking of multi-scalar territorial interactions that extend beyond traditional city boundaries and that deeply reconfigure rural–urban hydrosocial territories and interlinkages, the chapters demonstrate the need to reconsider and trouble the rural–urban dichotomy. The contributors scrutinize how existing approaches for securing urban water supply – ranging from water transfers to payments for ecosystem services – all rely on a myriad of techniques: they are produced by, and embedded in, specific institutional and legal arrangements, actor alliances, discourses, interests and technologies entwining local, regional and global scales. The different chapters show the need to better understand on-the-ground realities, taking account of inequalities in water access and control, as well as representation and cultural-political recognition among rural and urban subjects. Rural–Urban Water Struggles will be of great use to scholars of water governance and justice, environmental justice and political ecology. This book was originally published as a special issue of Water International.
Efforts to improve the water supplies used by people in rural areas of developing countries have run into serious obstacles: not only are public funds not available to build facilities for all, but many newly constructed facilities have fallen into disrepair and disuse. Along with the numerous failures there are also successes in this sector. From these successes a new view has begun to emerge of what the guiding principles of rural water supply strategies should be. This book brings together and spells out the constituents of this emerging view. The central message is that it is the local people themselves, not those trying to help them, who have the most important role to play. The community itself must be the primary decisionmaker, the primary investor, the primary organizer, and the primary overseer. The authors examine the implications of this primary principle for the main policy issues - the level of service to be provided in different settings, the level and mechanisms for cost recovery, the roles for the private and public sectors, and the role of women. The potential advantages of proceeding from this outlook, instead of the older top-down approaches, are considerable. Improvement efforts are more likely to meet felt needs, new facilities are more likely to be kept in service, and more communities are more likely to get safe water sooner.
Rural areas are a key sector in every nation's economy due to a sizeable majority of the population living therein, as well as their impact on global agriculture and food security. Rural development transcends the availability of infrastructure, technology, and industrialization to also encompass the enviro-cultural and psycho-social needs of its inhabitants. The necessity for greater and deliberate efforts targeting all aspects of development of these rural areas is required to sustain growth. The Handbook of Research on Rural Sociology and Community Mobilization for Sustainable Growth is an essential reference source investigating how global trends, state policies, and grassroots movements affect contemporary rural areas in both developed and developing countries. Featuring research on topics such as gender and rural development, micro-financing, and water resource management, this book is ideally designed for government officials, policy makers, professionals, researchers, and students seeking coverage on the sustainable development of rural areas.