Tag Archive | financing

A visit to Gammarth, Tunisia, or what I learnt at the African Development Bank’s retreat for rural water and sanitation

A visit to Gammarth, Tunisia, or what I learnt at the African Development Bank’s retreat for rural water and sanitation

By Harold Lockwood Last week in Gammarth, Tunis the African Development Bank called a meeting, attended by about 160 sector experts and other government officials, to launch a new coordination mechanism for its flagship Rural Water Supply and  Sanitation Initiative, or RWSSI. It was an interesting couple of days and through the various presentations, discussions, […]

Of squeaky wheels and grease – reflections of a social welfarist on the road

Of squeaky wheels and grease – reflections of a social welfarist on the road

By Harold Lockwood Recently I have been on a continent-hopping tour through a different range of meetings and events, from which I have seen a pattern emerging, or at least a series of questions in my own mind, as I carry out my work in the WASH sector at an international level.

Alice in waterland: a fantasy

Alice in waterland: a fantasy

This story is fictional. Any resemblance to real situations or persons is pure coincidence. When Alice stepped through the mirroring water surface into waterland, the first creature she came across was a rabbit, wearing a UN-blue jacket, looking frantically at its watch. “It is nearly time. Only three more years to go till 2015. So […]

Apples and oranges: a comparative assessment in WASH

Apples and oranges: a comparative assessment in WASH

A few weeks ago, an interesting email discussion was held on “water point mapping” D-Group of the Rural Water Supply Network (RWSN). Part of the discussion focused on how much it costs to map or monitor all water systems in a country. Various figures were floating around in the discussion. But when looking at these […]

Uganda Sector Review 2012: are we still seeing the forest from the trees?

Uganda Sector Review 2012: are we still seeing the forest from the trees?

Reblogged from WASH in Uganda: This week 250 practitioners and policy makers from the Uganda Water and Environment sector met for 3 days during the annual Joint Sector Review Meeting. In my previous blog I focused on the challenge of stagnation in rural water: for the past years we haven’t seen any increase in coverage […]

“A bit more for some” may not be a bad idea

“A bit more for some” may not be a bad idea

Two weeks ago, the “management and support” working group of the RWSN had its first meeting. This meeting focused specifically on management models and support arrangements for piped water supply in small towns. As rural settlements become bigger, a shift is made from point sources – like boreholes with handpumps – to piped systems. This […]

Stagnating coverage and functionality in rural water in Uganda: can this nut be cracked?

Stagnating coverage and functionality in rural water in Uganda: can this nut be cracked?

Next week more than 200 practitioners and policy makers from government, civil society, private sector and donors will come together for the annual Joint Water and Environment Sector Review in Uganda to review progress and set-backs during the past year and discuss and decide on priorities for the coming year.  For rural water Uganda is […]

Community-based management is dead; long live community-based management

Community-based management is dead; long live community-based management

Last week, we had our first Triple-S research seminar, discussing the first findings from the assessments of service provision around point sources in Ghana and Uganda. Although I had seen a sneak preview of some of the data, the consolidated results were shocking. After seeing them, I was tempted to declare community-based management (particularly of […]

Team GB puts ‘sports policy’ into practice, but can DfID ‘team WASH’ do the same?

Team GB puts ‘sports policy’ into practice, but can DfID ‘team WASH’ do the same?

By Harold Lockwood We all know how successful team GB was at the London Olympics with 29 golds and 65 medals overall (London medals). This was a fantastic achievement and the result of years of preparation and putting into practice a comprehensive sports policy for the UK. It wasn’t just investment in the athlete or […]

The way we work

The way we work

In this short video, Vida Duti talks about the way Triple-S works in Ghana, and the difference between being a cop and being a change agent. More clips from this series of seven can be viewed here.