This paper concludes that there is chronic underfunding of rural water services, to meet the costs required to provide and sustain a basic level of... Read more...
Boreholes with handpumps continue to play a significant role as a main source and even in communities with piped networks are used as alternatives when piped networks fail. However, they failed to supply a basic level of service to more than 36% of users in any of the research countries. In the... Read more...
A basic level of service is assumed to be achieved when all the following criteria have been realised by a majority of the population in the service area: Quantity: people access a minimum of 20 litres per person per day, Quality: acceptable quality (judged by user perception and country standards... Read more...
WASHCost research strongly suggests that the rural poor are missing out due to failure to finance water services properly, especially recurrent expenditure subsequent to initial hardware provision. Even the relatively small amount of additional money that is required is 6-12 times bigger than the... Read more...
What you do not measure, you do not cost. What you do not cost, you cannot do: reporting systems must change to reflect the real costs of providing services that last. Read more...
Two decades of investment in water supply infrastructure has substantially increased the number of people with access to an improved water service. However, high breakdown levels and lack of support for monitoring, maintenance and repairs renders services unreliable. People, systems and finances... Read more...
Monitoring often ceases three to five years after a contract has been signed. Finding cost data older than three years is a problem even when projects are implemented by governments, donors or the private sector. Where it does exist, data is rarely sufficiently disaggregated to show the difference... Read more...
To achieve and sustain basic service levels, a relatively small amount of additional money channeled to cover recurrent expenditure in absolute terms could be enough. For boreholes and handpumps 3-6 per person per year and 3-15 per person per year for piped system. Read more...
Rural water services in WASHCost research countries are chronically underfunded, with insufficient resources to provide and sustain a basic level of service that meets national norms and standards. In communities researched by WASHCost, most people did not receive this basic minimum, although they... Read more...
WASHCost Mozambique is saying farewell to their partners in the country, but leaving behind a treasure chest of resources. In a document highlighting ten key findings from the project, Andre Uandela says: “The project has come to a close, but the ideas and approaches have been introduced into the... Read more...
“The real costs of sustainable services” campaign was launched in October 2012. The first theme focused on “costing sustainable sanitation services”. This December and January, water services will be in the spotlight. We will share with you key findings and messages from WASHCost’s research on... Read more...
Vera van der Grift interviewed Eric Stowe from Splash on how his organisation is using the life-cycle costs approach for cost modelling of their programmes in Asia. Eric explains how he and colleagues have slightly tweaked the language to make 'capital maintenance expenditures' understandable for... Read more...
500 WASH sector professionals have already signed on to take part in our first two editions of the “Costing Sustainable Services” online training course! Read more...
Millennium Water Alliance (MWA) is a champion of the life-cycle costs approach. They, along with partners, are applying the approach in Ethiopia, Kenya, and parts of Latin America to improve monitoring and evaluation of their WASH programmes. IRC’s WASHCost discussed with Susan Dundon of MWA and... Read more...
Vera van der Grift interviewed Mike Kang from Engineers Without Borders-Canada how his organisation applies the life-cycle costs in Malawi. Read more...