Emerging themes on considering water equity (REACH Research Brief)

The REACH programme aims to generate improvements in water security for the poor by working at the interface of water security, risk and poverty research and practice, spanning across the themes of resource sustainability, inclusive services and sustainable growth. Recognizing social inequalities forms a critical element of the programme, as it is a vital building block for enhancing and maintaining water security for all. By early 2019, there were 23 studies within the REACH programme that included exploration of differentiated (particularly gender driven) experiences, practices and needs related to water. While the studies are mostly on-going, this research brief has been developed to spur interest and awareness in four areas that are underexplored in academia and underrepresented within development agencies

Addressing socio-economic inequalities in Lodwar and broader Turkana (workshop report)

The REACH Programme held a workshop entitled “Socio-economic aspects of flash floods, water and climate” on Wednesday 23rd February 2022 at the Cradle Tented Camp Lodwar, Turkana County. The risks around flash floods, water and climate are among the top worries among the poor population of Lodwar. These risks are experienced differently depending on multiple socio-economic factors. Several organisations have been enabling people’s survival while planning strategic and sustainable solutions to improve people’s lives. However, it is a process with many uncertainties, challenges, unexpected trajectories and undesirable consequences. This meeting aimed to discuss how water and flood risks relate to socio-economic inequalities. There were presentations on critical gender and intersectional considerations on what to think about at the time of interventions, socioeconomic aspects of flash flood risk evaluation and flooding and water insecurity in Lodwar

Moving, staying and returning under uncertainty: Labour migration and identity formation among Young Nepali Men

Increasing socio-economic opportunities for low skilled labour migration are drastically transforming villages in the rural Global South. Based on fieldwork in rural eastern Nepal, this article analyses how the possibility for mobility influences the ways young men craft their identities aspiring for development (bikāsa). The young men use mobility-staying-returning as a focal point for developing their identities as categorical yet fluid. They actively split and defend their identities against the opposing position yet remain flexible due to the high social, political and economic uncertainty that penetrates many spheres of their lives. Pro-migrants rationalize their identities of a ‘victim’ due to lack of development and a ‘modern man’ aspiring for mobility, pro-stayers position themselves as ‘developers’ of the village, defending their identity against migration and other ‘idle’ stayers. Pro-returnees, in turn, position themselves as ‘active doers’, share the notion of the ‘realization’ of local economic opportunities and their own role in their country’s development that they pursue via individual improvements to their livelihoods rather than through collective decision-making. This article demonstrates the need to analyse the multiple formation of identities through all three perspectives of moving, staying and returning rather than focusing on one type of identity formation, as is usually preferred. Moreover, it suggests the need to explore uncertainty in order to understand fluidity and tensions between positions in relation to migration, as well as the nuances of socio-economic differences

On considering climate resilience in urban water security: a review of the vulnerability of the urban poor in sub-Saharan Africa

Climate shock‐related water insecurity has a significant impact on poverty, and vice versa, with poor people adversely impacted by different hazards. Many studies have focused on rural communities resulting in a lack of evidence on the vulnerability of urban dwellers. In this review, we explore the literature on the vulnerability of the urban poor to floods, droughts, and cholera in Sub‐Saharan Africa. We particularly highlight the structural challenges and systemic inequalities that are increasing the vulnerability of the urban poor including the differential experiences of women and children. We conclude that poor people have: unequal opportunities to cope with shocks, being deprived from access to water services that wealthier households have; their needs are inequitably ignored; and cumulative vulnerability that reverberates climate shocks into smaller consequences that can have dramatic effects. Therefore, the pathways out of poverty are limited for the urban poor. This is not only due to factors of political economy such as the location and construction materials of houses, but also legacies of discrimination and their reproduction. Individual vulnerabilities are frequently increased due to the roles and responsibilities assigned to people of particular genders and/or ages. We find that these differential vulnerabilities are crucial yet poorly researched. There is also a lack of evidence for the manifold effects of drought on the urban poor. Building on the urban climate resilience literature we argue that policy makers and practitioners must consider who water security is for

Equitable urban water security: beyond connections on premises

Despite worldwide advances in urban water security, equitable access to safely managed drinking water remains a challenge in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Piped water on premises is widely considered the gold standard for drinking water provision and is expanding rapidly in small and medium urban centres in LMICs. However, intermittency in urban water supply can lead to unreliability and water quality issues, posing a key barrier to equitable water security. Leveraging mixed methods and multiple data sets, this study investigates to what extent urban water security is equitable in a small town in Northern Ethiopia with almost uniform access to piped water services. We have developed a household water security index that considers issues of quality, quantity, and reliability. We demonstrate that there is high spatial variability in water security between households connected to the piped water system. Moreover, reliability of piped water supply did not equate to high water security in every case, as accessibility of appropriate alternative supplies and storage mediated water security. Urban water planning in LMICs must go beyond the physical expansion of household water connections to consider the implications of spatiality, intermittency of supply, and gendered socio-economic vulnerability to deliver equitable urban water security.</p

Negotiating spaces of marginality and independence: on women entrepreneurs within Ethiopian urbanization and water precarity

In the context of the growth of Ethiopia's market economy the importance of women-owned enterprises is acknowledged, with barriers to economic success outlined in a limited number of studies. However, the daily struggles and embodied experiences of low-skilled women entrepreneurs in informal economies, as well as precarious and unequal intermittent water environments, have been insufficiently understood. We analyse how women strive for and negotiate their independence through spatiality and how services, specifically water, affect their ability to develop their business spaces. The evidence derives from five studies, using mixed methods, conducted in the small town of Wukro, Ethiopia. The methods used were household surveys, a water diary, and interviews with women entrepreneurs - owners of coffee, alcohol, and hair salons businesses. Our study finds that they develop their businesses through the simultaneous presence of various, multilevel spaces of marginality/paradoxical spaces and articulation of independence as control over one's business and body. Unlike the positive term ‘empowerment’, the lens of negotiating ‘independence’ integrates spaces of conflicting subjectivities, where marginality and resistance, suffering and claimed control, interpellation, and re-construction of own identities are simultaneously present. We suggest that water struggles are analysed not only through the evaluation of water shortages and unequal geographical sectorization but also through the perspective of ‘water precarity’ (Sultana, 2020) as in our study it was a water-induced lack of control over businesses and daily lives that caused the most suffering. We highlight that this multidimensional approach is pivotal in supporting women's entrepreneurship and gender equality

A relational vulnerability analytic: Exploring hybrid methodologies for human dimensions of climate change research in the Himalayas

Vulnerability assessments are critical tools when exploring the Human Dimensions of Climate Change in the Global South. Additionally, Social Ecological Systems research utilizes such assessments to describe and predict potential spaces/tools of policy intervention. However, much of the assessment methodology fails to address the coupled structural processes underlying vulnerability and the experience of climate change. First, most scholarship does not operationalize mixed-methods research using plural epistemologies. Second, it fails to incorporate the communally produced knowledge of marginalized regional populations. Ultimately, power inequalities and their impact on vulnerability within complex adaptive systems, are overwhelmingly ignored. This project attempts to address these issues through a ‘Relational Vulnerability Analytic’ (RVA). We utilize a plural epistemological approach to construct an analytic that envisions the various relationships, processes and tools that need to be cultivated and managed in order to empower the community as co-producers of knowledge, while challenging the disciplinary bias in explorations of climate change risk and adaptation. Our method brings top-down spatial analysis tools, mathematical models, grounded ethnographic fieldwork and participatory feminist epistemologies into productive tension to reveal the sources of vulnerability and the agency of subjects, in rural Himalayan households. Additionally, we addresses the appeal for long term, collaborative, multi-dimensional research mobilization in the Himalayas. While the analytic is parameterized for the Himalayan region, it can be implemented in other regions with certain salient customizations. The project concludes that future efforts should be to operationalize this analytic for different regions and populations