Water scarcity affects billions of people worldwide. A recent report calls for a more comprehensive assessment of water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) interventions, despite the fact that many projects from governments, NGOs, and private businesses are dedicated to offering safely managed water and sanitation by 2030.
According to a study by associate professor of geography and sustainable development at the University of Miami, Justin Stoler, these and other challenges must be taken into account when thinking about international WASH projects. Examples of these challenges include mental health, violence, injury, and discrimination.
According to Stoler, “Water quality is still important, but there are other consequences of the water crisis that need to be considered when it involves one’s health and well-being.He noted that most people around the world had what he called a “20th-century mentality,” where they look at water projects through the prism of water quality. There are many detrimental implications of water scarcity on people’s lives. However, water-quality data remains to support the myth of what safe water implies not taking into account other problems like mental health, gender disparities, and injuries that could occur when acquiring water.
According to the report, millions of people endure harassment, assault, anxiety, sadness, or absenteeism from job, school, or family care when getting or drinking domestic water, even when it is safe to consume.
Stoler adds that studies and information that are used to inform policy, carry out WASH programs, and meet infrastructure requirements rarely take these extra pressures into account. He believes that because water interventions likely understate their effects, governments and policymakers undervalue WASH efforts.
“For example, media outlets frequently feature pictures of little females and kids carrying water.The laborious trek to get there, however, is something we hardly ever see. This journey can be hampered by challenging terrain, animal attacks, or apprehension about predatory males along the way, according to Stoler.
“Carrying loads of water every day puts a strain on the human body. There is also a psychological burden, which includes the anxiety women feel when they are at risk of violence or injury when finding water or when there is a chance of domestic violence if there aren’t enough water supplies.
He continued, “WASH projects generally improve these conditions, but program administrators frequently pay too much attention to water quality and neglect to track other important improvements in quality of life.
Researchers from the University of Notre Dame’s Pulte Institute for Global Development and Keough School of Global Affairs worked together collaboratively on the study.
Stoler collaborated with two Notre Dame colleagues: Ellis Adams, an associate professor of geography and environmental policy at the Keough School of Global Affairs, and Danice Brown Guzmán, an associate director for the Pulte Institute’s Evidence and Learning Division who specializes in experimental and large-scale gathering of information to measure impacts from food security, gender, education, and WASH projects.
“This initiative offers an outline for a novel approach to tracking and evaluating WASH programs that will substantially emphasize the broad effect of these interventions,” claims Stoler.” “We hope to attract financing from international institutions to ramp up WASH projects and make global safe water a reality by demonstrating the wide-ranging effects of WASH projects—and their revolutionary relationships with other grand challenges related to poverty, food security, education, and others.”
The research paper, “Determining the transformative WASH: A new paradigm to assess water, sanitation, and hygiene interventions,” is currently accessible in WIREs Water.