|
Water: Issues Beyond Public Health By Joachim Ibeziako Ezeji
Around the world, hundreds of millions of men, women and children live in extreme poverty. Their poverty is multi-faceted: besides lacking money, they have limited access to education, suffer from poor health, have little political weight, and are vulnerable to all manner of external shocks (droughts, wars, economic crisis etc.).
The poor often have limited or restricted access to resources: natural, physical or financial. Key amongst these is water-in terms of both quality and quantity. A great many of the poor men and women in urban, rural and peri-urban settings base their livelihoods on ‘informal activities’-----small-scale cropping, livestock rearing, agro-processing and other micro-enterprises.
In many of these activities, an adequate water supply is a crucial enabling resource: used in, or necessary for, the activity itself; freeing time (by reducing time spent collecting water); or as a key element in improved health that in turn enables people to work. Water supplies provided to households therefore have a huge potential to impact on poverty. This is particularly true for the poorest (and for women, who are in majority amongst the poorest).
But how much water is needed?, How much water could be involved?, Who supplies these water?, How can we quantify its contribution to poverty alleviation?, Is it possible to incorporate these productive uses of water into water development schemes and systems being funded and implemented by government and donor groups especially in urban areas?
Beyond public health concerns; water remains a productive resource which is defined (primarily with regard to the domestic water supply sector) as a quantity of water over and above domestic ‘basic needs’ that is used for small scale productive uses at the household level. Addressing the use of water for small-scale productive activities can reduce poverty by developing and managing water resources sustainably and in ways that maximize the economic and social value added per unit volume supplied.
At the just concluded national water and sanitation forum held in Abuja; Nigeria’s Water Resources Minister Alhaji M.S.Shagari had acknowledged the prime role of the Federal Ministry of Water Resources on poverty alleviation. According to him; “the federal ministry of water resources was, as a priority sector charged to pro-actively play a pivotal role in the major programs of the federal government, particularly in the areas of poverty alleviation, food security, integrated rural development and employment generation”.
However, how well or how far the ministry has impacted this responsibility is still under investigation, especially within the realms of the average Nigerian household where the need is immense.
Further to this, was the clarification by Mrs. Amina J. Ibrahim (OFR), the President’s Senior Special Assistant on the Millennium Development Goals(MDGs); who also, speaking at the water forum, had explained how, in September 2005, Nigeria successfully negotiated Debt-Relief of 18 billion US dollars and how that has released roughly 750 million dollars, or 100 billion naira a year in savings to Nigeria’s annual budget at the federal level. She went further to reveal that the president had then directed that all those savings be directed towards pro-poor projects and programs via the creation of a dedicated fund within the budget, which according to her, is now referred to as OPEN.
Throwing more light on all these issues, Mrs. A. Ibrahim disclosed that the Federal Ministry of Water Resources in the 2006 federal budget; received more than nineteen billion Naira, to be spent on the construction of boreholes, small earth dams and other irrigation projects that would directly benefit the poor.
To safeguard this budget she went ahead to reveal that her office was duly mandated to help guide these funds to appropriate projects, and then track them. This she disclosed, the MDGs office does so through a new accounting platform in the Accountant General’s office, and a unique partnership between consultants and the civil society who are to ensure quality and secure feedback on project impact on these investments at the local level from beneficiaries. The feedback, according to her is reported to a quarterly Presidential Committee on the MDGs which have a broad representation of key stakeholders across the country.
In view of the foregoing, it is germane to emphasize that despite its large size and abundant natural endowments that Nigeria is among the world’s poorest nations with a GDP figure per head of US$1,050 in 2003 compared with an average of US$1,328 for all less developed countries. Over 70% of Nigerian people live on less than US$1 a day. In Senator Udo Udoma’s own words “with respect to key Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), poverty and social indicators; Nigeria compares unfavorably with the average for low income countries”.
There is no doubt that in urban Nigeria as well as many other third world cities, the sheer lack of economic opportunities has often been responsible for rural-urban migration as well as the bourgeoning growth of slums. Sadly, this growth in the urban population has not been met with commensurate infrastructure. The result is, festering poor livelihoods and urbanization of poverty. The product of dwindling livelihoods is the resort to various small scale entrepreneurial activities. Most of these depend largely on unavailable regular water supply.
However, data from the MDGs office Abuja reports that in 1990, the proportion of the population with sustainable access to an improved water source was 30%; compared to 60% in 2006, and which is only 5% short of the target set at the UN.
The validity of this claim is still raising dust as many NGOs at the Abuja forum insisted that it was spurious and cannot be substantiated. Realities in many urban centers in Nigeria where water utilities have long gone comatose support this disclaimer. These NGOs argue that access coverage in Nigeria should not be measured on colossal amount of money spent on water infrastructure but on the actual project output, especially the impact on water users or beneficiaries. Presently, presentations of policy and achievements by the federal Ministry of Water Resources are generally characterized by a lack of realism. A striking example of this is the choice to use data on installed capacity, rather than survey data, to measure progress to the achievement of the MDG of 70% access to an improved water source. The Federal Ministry claims to be well on course, citing progress from 65% coverage in 2004 to 68% coverage in 2005.These figures on installed capacity, however, ignore the well-known high level of non-functioning installed capacity (broken boreholes and non-functioning reticulated networks) in order to give an unrealistically optimistic picture.
Further to this disclaimer is the UNDP (2005) report which posits that 60% or about 78million Nigerians lack access to improved water supply in 2003.
In 1999, an estimate of 32million (30%) of Nigerians lived in urban areas, compared to 21million (or 20%) in small towns and 54million (or 50%) in rural areas. During this period, only 15million of the 32million urban population i.e. 46% had access to water supply.
High operational costs, poor revenue, epileptic power supply, inadequate funding, ill-motivated personnel, aging plants and machineries have ensured the poor performance of many of the 36 state water utilities in Nigeria. None of these utilities as at 2006 is meeting the domestic water needs of half of its cities. Available records show that (example) the water utility in Owerri is currently struggling to meet 30% of the city’s population. Records from other utilities shows; Lagos as 30%, Jos as 35%, Abuja as 41%, Jigawa as 35%, Calabar as 40% and Lafia as 41%.
Compared to city centers, peri-urban centers and small towns are worse-off in many parts of Nigeria. In these places, alternative service providers especially water trucks, kiosks and vendors are in overwhelming control of the water ‘market’. These places; yet often serves as economic ‘buffer’ zones to activities in urban centers. The reality here is that the role of water as a sustainable poverty alleviation tool for the Nigeria’s ‘poorest of the poor’ seemed not to have been fully grabbed. In Nigeria, the provision of water in small towns is still ad hoc. There are virtually no utility providers and piped household water networks are generally lacking.
The actual statistics on sustainable access to water in Nigeria is still in perpetual haze. Reasons for this could be legion, but the consequence is already having a debilitating effect, not only on planning but also poverty alleviation. According to Engr.M.H.Iliyas, a Consultant to the Federal Ministry of Water Resources; “Due to lack of reliable data on the existing water supply and sanitation situation in the country, figures being quoted now on service coverage from various authorities including those from the State Water Agencies (SWA) themselves are hardly better than guesses”
In Nigeria, if water is a ladder in economic development with higher rungs representing steps up the path to economic well being, there are roughly 60% of households, who live lacking opportunities, initiatives, empowerment and support to get a foot on the first rung of the development ladder. They are too poor, ill, jobless, hungry or destitute even to get a foot on the first rung of the water ladder. They may not all be dying today, but they are all fighting for survival each day. If they are not the victims of serious drought or flood, or an episode of serious illness, they are victims of communal clashes, mis-governance, failed infrastructure, comatose utilities or a collapse of the Nigerian economy, the result is likely to be extreme suffering and perhaps even death. Cash earnings are pennies a day. The bulk of these people are found in urban centers with others spread in small towns and rural parts of Nigeria.
The very hardest part of economic well being or wealth is getting the first foot on the water ladder. Households and countries such as Nigeria, at the very bottom of the world’s income distribution, in extreme poverty, tend to be stuck. The challenge for our democracy at all tiers of governance is to assist the Nigerian poor to escape the misery of extreme poverty so that they may begin their own ascent up the ladder of economic well being which the water ladder offers. The end of poverty, in this sense, is not only the end of extreme suffering but also the beginning of economic progress and of hope and security that accompany economic development.
The end of extreme poverty is at hard-within Nigeria, but only if Nigerian leaders grasp the historic opportunity in front of them. There already exists a bold set of commitments that is halfway to that target: the Millennium Development Goals, the eight goals that all 191 UN member states unanimously agreed to in 2002 by signing the United Nations Millennium declaration. These goals are important targets for cutting poverty in half by the year 2015, compared with a baseline of 1990.They are bold but achievable, even though dozens of African countries are not yet on track to achieve them. They represent a crucial mid-station on the path to ending extreme poverty by the year 2025.
To meet the economic challenges of our time, we first have to understand the eminent place of water especially at the domestic level, where it is also put into active productive uses for income making. This does not in any way eclipse the interconnectedness of water to every and each of the goals of the MDGs. According to Mrs.Amina Ibrahim; “Clean water means good health. Good health allows a child to go to school, or contributes to a person’s economic productivity. If the child goes to school, they will learn to better protect themselves from HIV/AIDS and other diseases later in life”
How then, do poor households respond when incomes decline, jobs becomes scarce and spending on food and services increases? Some households are more vulnerable than others, and not all cope equally well. As Nigerian government and her development partners grapple with the problems of poverty in the country, an understanding of how the poor respond to economic crises has become increasingly important. This understanding can help ensure that interventions aimed at reducing poverty, complement and strengthen people’s own inventive solutions rather than substitute for or block them.
All over the world, the poor have always had strategies for the day-to-day coping with low incomes, high consumer prices, and inadequate or unreliable economic and social infrastructure. But to withstand sudden economic shocks or longer-term economic crises, households must be able to survive such periods without irreversible damage to the productive capacity of their members and their net asset position. When asset bases become so depleted that even an upturn in the economy cannot reverse the damage, households are extremely vulnerable. The ability of households to avoid or reduce vulnerability and to increase economic productivity depends not only on their initial assets, but also on their ability to transform those assets into income, food, or other basic necessities effectively. Assets can be transformed in two distinct ways: through the intensification of existing strategies and through the development of new or diversified strategies.
How –and how effectively assets are used and what strategies are adopted to cope with economic stress is determined by household, intra-household, and community factors. At the household level, internal life cycle events that affect the structure and composition of households-births, death, marriage-can affects their ability to respond to external changes. Within the household asymmetries in rights and obligations on the basis of gender and age translate into differences in ability to cope with economic difficulties.
The community’s capacity to respond to changes in the external environment may depend on its stock of social capital-the trust, norms, and reciprocity networks embedded in social organizations, as well as the government.
In view of the foregoing, it has become germane that in tackling poverty that the government and development partners must come to terms with the realisation that,
Despite having access to cultivable land around their homes, some well-off households rarely get involved in viable economic activities derivable from such ‘free’ land. However an increasing number of households have become involved in domestic economic agriculture such as vegetable gardening. These households grow mostly vegetables and fruits which are either consumed locally or sold in the local market. In this way, the crop either saves family income by reducing expenditure budget (which would have been used to buy these crops in the market) or brings income to the household.
Further to these gains are the gains of improved nourishment added to the body through enriched family menu. Other related gainful activities in this regard are livestock rearing and aquaculture at the household level. There are no doubts that households that are involved in this activities are often better-off economically than their poor counterparts who do not.
Domestic users of water for other economic activities also include households directly involved in agro-processing e.g. feed mill, mini-abattoir etc. construction e.g. roof tiles, etc. restaurants, packaging of water sachets a.k.a ‘pure water’, cottage, car washing, floral/botanical gardens and cooling of drinks and ice blocks etc.
The entrepreneurs involved in these activities are either marketing their wares at or near their homes or get them to the major cities where the market exists. But in using water and largely depending on it for productivity and income has become an issue beyond what used to be the case.
A World Bank 1994c report has shown that the provision of infrastructure is critical for the urban poor. While social services such as education ensure that people can gain skills and knowledge, economic infrastructure such as water, transport, and electricity-along with health care-ensure that they can use their skills and knowledge productively. Communities gaining access to infrastructure in the late 1970’s were able to reduce their vulnerability through strategic use of the services provided. But when resources for maintaining this infrastructure later declined, the study’s result showed that households faced access and quality problems. Where obtaining services has become more time-consuming, such as collecting water, people have less time for income-generating activities. Where services have become prohibitively expensive, such as health care, or declined in quality, household health can deteriorate.
Households’ income-earning capacity affects their ability to pay the costs of public services or to substitute private for public services. This means that some households are more vulnerable than others when public provision declines and it raises long-term questions about economic productivity.
Access to domestic water enables people to engage in household level activities to produce goods and services that potentially increase income and provide an entry point into the domestic economy. It is obvious that water is regularly being used for productive purposes even when the systems were only designed for domestic consumption such as drinking, cooking and bathing/washing and even when water was scarce; and that productive use of domestic water could contribute to poverty alleviation when accompanied by credit schemes, enterprise development support, management training, and measures to include the poorer households.
These issues have become pertinent vis avis prevailing posturing on poverty alleviation at all level of governance. It is also germane to appreciate that until recently, the multiple benefits of domestic water supplies had not received as much attention as they deserved. The traditional view of domestic water as largely a ‘public health’ benefit persisted even beyond the 1980s when international agencies continued to focus on ‘clean drinking water and adequate sanitation’ as a key right and development goal (IRC,2003).
|