An Environmental Justice Issue

Having drifted a little from the focus of women in Africa in relation to water, this week I have looked at an article by Nghana Lewis entitled ‘An Issue of Environmental Justice: Understanding the Relationship among HIV/AIDs Infection in Women, Water Distribution, and Global Investment in Sub-Saharan Africa’. Whilst this article is a little dated (published in 2009) it focuses on linking two challenges that sub-Saharan African women face: HIV/AIDS and water.

Lewis remarks that when analysed together within this specific context, HIV/AIDS and the water crisis actually represent an environmental justice issue, particularly as among those living with HIV/AIDS across the globe, 70% are women of African descent (Lewis, 2009: 40). He argues that insufficient governmental management of water distribution has increased the vulnerability of women to health issues including HIV/AIDS. Additionally, he links this back to policies put in place by European powers during the period of decolonisation in Africa, which he suggests have resulted in clean water being unevenly distributed within Sub-Saharan Africa with rural women bearing the greatest burden of this.

This article is extremely interesting, and one I would encourage readers of this blog to explore as Lewis is one of few academic writers who has specifically linked HIV/AIDS and the water crisis and framed this from the perspective of gender. I have already explored, within a previous blog post, sanitation issues for women in relation to water in Africa, but to reconsider this by looking at the specific issue of HIV/AIDS has been particularly enlightening as this really demonstrates just how important it is to view water issues from the perspective of gender (though  it worth remembering that this is certainly not exclusive to Africa).

This led me to a more recent article by Krumdieck et al. (2016) entitled ‘Household water insecurity is associated with a range of negative consequences among pregnant Kenyan women of mixed HIV status’. This article suggests that water insecurity has a serious role in the health outcomes of women, particularly pregnant women, with HIV in Africa, though it is not entirely clear what this role is. They assessed the water insecurity experiences of 323 pregnant women in Kenya with mixed HIV status. Shockingly, 77.7% had had at least on experience of water insecurity in the past month.

Again, this article clearly links issues of water with HIV/AIDS issues for women. Both articles call for a serious need to address these issues via stronger government policies. A key issue is that of unequal distribution between rural and urban communities as well as between the poor and wealthy. By creating the better distribution of clean and safe water among all citizens of Africa, these articles suggest that health issues such as HIV/AIDS will be at least partly addressed and this will positively benefit women in particular by extension. However, that is not to say that distributing safe and clean water throughout Africa is by any means a simple task, but articles like this are clearly trying to encourage decision-makers to at least begin to address this problem.

References

Krumdieck, N.R., Collins, S.M., Wekesa, P., Mbullo, P., Boateng, G.O., Onono, M. and Young, S.L., 2016. Household water insecurity is associated with a range of negative consequences among pregnant Kenyan women of mixed HIV status. Journal of Water and Health, 14(6), pp.1028-1031.

Lewis, N. (2009). An Issue of Environmental Justice: Understanding the Relationship among HIV/AIDS Infection in Women, Water Distribution, and Global Investment in Rural Sub-Saharan Africa. Black Women, Gender & Families, 3(1), 39-64.

A Stronger Response to the Resistance of Female Empowerment

My blog post entitled ‘The Damaging Assumptions of Gender Mainstreaming’ posted on the 27th of November, received two really interesting comments. Baljeet Lakhan in particular referred me to an article called “‘African Culture’ is the biggest threat to the women’s rights movement” by Patience Akumu. This article encouraged me to re-think my initial ideas about the sensitivity NGOs, international organisations and national governments should have when attempting to implement female empowerment initiatives in particular regions of Africa. These initiatives can include encouraging women to give their opinions on the provision and management of basic services including water.

Whilst I have stated that time is needed to allow those that resist female empowerment (both men and women) to adjust their feelings regarding this issue, and I have acknowledged that female empowerment cannot be forced onto a community in the hope it will serve as a solution to problems regarding things like water management, this article (http://africanarguments.org/2015/03/09/african-culture-is-the-biggest-threat-to-the-womens-rights-movement-by-patience-akumu/) has made me reconsider how sensitive these actors should actually be. Perhaps it is too weak an approach to suggest that we must be sensitive to those who feel uncomfortable with the concept of female empowerment as still so much needs to be done to give women equal rights in Africa.

Akumu makes the points that women who try to take their place in the public sphere in Africa, quickly meet with ‘that glass ceiling called ‘African culture’’. Furthermore, she suggests that African women can only enjoy their rights within certain limits and the line is drawn when African men start to feel threatened. Female empowerment and gender equality in Africa, and indeed around the world, is critical to make women safer as well as ensure women’s voices are heard. This will result in more stakeholder participation for schemes such as those dealing with the management of water, and whilst this may not result in a perfect system, surely a greater wealth of knowledge and experience can only be a positive contribution.

Ultimately, I still stand by the point I made previously that female empowerment initiatives cannot be enforced on communities in Africa as a solution to issues associated with basic services such as water supply. Furthermore, if female empowerment initiatives are employed as a solution to these challenges, then a situation where empowering women has not resulted in improvements in basic services might be used as an example of how gender equality makes no difference. This could therefore be counter-productive and give communities an excuse to reject these initiatives.

In fact, female empowerment is important even if we do not see immediate improvements as the advantages reach far beyond the provision of basic services and the benefits will extend into the long-term. Similarly, as the article again mentions, there are examples of women in many parts of Africa demonstrating for their rights and challenging those who seek to oppress them. Female empowerment is crucial and ultimately allows the opinions of a major stakeholder to be heard, which is clearly important for water management schemes. Therefore, perhaps we shouldn’t be quite so sensitive to those who do not want female empowerment in their communities.

References

http://africanarguments.org/2015/03/09/african-culture-is-the-biggest-threat-to-the-womens-rights-movement-by-patience-akumu/

A Gap in the Literature

This week, I wanted to explore the innovations of women in Africa with regards to their domestic use of water having read a sentence in the Wendoh (2005) article last week which alluded to this idea. Considering women are more likely to have control over the use of water in the home for the purposes of cleaning, cooking and drinking, it stands to reason that, in a hydrologically variable continent such as Africa, in particular Sub-Saharan Africa, women will have come up with innovative ways of using water effectively within the home.

However, I have found there to be very few articles on this topic. There certainly seems to be a gap in the literature with regards to any innovative techniques women have come up with in order to use domestic water in the most efficient way possible. The collection of water by women can actually give them the opportunity to communicate, creating social cohesion with other women (https://www.ifad.org/documents/10180/2ffa1e63-8a8e-47ed-a4aa-cbf249fafab2). Therefore, women could perhaps seize these moments to share ideas about how best to use water in the home environment, particularly as this is arguably the only space in which women have control over water and can use it in the way they see fit as they are often excluded from discussions of more larger scale water management issues.

There seems to be a real focus in both literature and research on women’s exclusion from water management issues as well as how local governance and NGOs can include women in decision-making processes. There does not seem to be any real recognition of how women have themselves come up with innovative uses of water within their domain.

Certainly empowering women to be able to participate in decision-making processes and improving their access to land for agriculture is important, but this does ignore what women are doing now and seems to dismiss the fact that women have been coming up with their own small scale water management ‘schemes’ within their homes. I am not suggesting that women’s current actions are suitable and there shouldn’t be improvement or change, but perhaps the first stages of improvement need to not dismiss the actions of women in Africa at present and actually use these innovations in order to begin empowering women, giving them control over their empowerment rather than defining it for them.

I think it is important to remember that when empowering any stakeholder or community in water management issues, whether solely women or any other marginalised group, solutions cannot just come from above and then be enforced onto that particular community. Communities and stakeholders need to consulted for any ideas they have developed or thought of themselves as communities can come up with small-scale solutions that can be implemented with the help of other actors rather than the actors coming in and dictating how the community should act. 

If any readers of this post do know of studies undertaken which assess current innovations of women in Africa with regards to the domestic use of water, I would be grateful for any comments.

References

https://www.ifad.org/documents/10180/2ffa1e63-8a8e-47ed-a4aa-cbf249fafab2

Wendoh, S., & Wallace, T. (2005). Re-thinking gender mainstreaming in African NGOs and communities. Gender & Development, 13(2), 70-79.

The Damaging Assumptions of Gender Mainstreaming

This week, I read an interesting article by Wendoh and Wallace (2006) entitled ‘Re-thinking gender mainstreaming in African NGOs and communities’. It addresses some of the challenges faced when undertaking gender mainstreaming initiatives. The article examined the situation in four African countries (Zambia, Rwanda, Uganda and Gambia) as these are countries with contrasting economic, political, religious and cultural contexts.

Though this article does not directly mention any connection with water or water management schemes, it does demonstrate that whilst female empowerment is considered necessary and important by academics, international organisations and others, there can be resistance when trying to implement gender equality initiatives within local communities. Furthermore, these gender equality initiatives do affect all levels of development and economics, including, of course, issues related to water. Local NGOs actually felt that gender mainstreaming was for the benefit of donors rather than local communities as work to address gender inequality issues is usually donor-promoted through government initiatives. Local NGOs and communities felt these initiatives were imposed upon them and so were either skeptical or had no real understanding of the issues.

Whilst some governments in Africa have increased the representation of women in parliament and are working on gender policies, resistance has been found at implementation level as people give higher priority to other activities. Most donors want around two-thirds of the main beneficiaries to be women but many governments have decided one-third is more appropriate as they fear a great number would exclude men. There is clearly misunderstanding by cultural policy makers as to how gender inequality is perceived on a local level.

During interviews with line ministries in the four countries, resistance was found to be due to concepts of gender being culturally inappropriate as it was considered to be a direct threat to male power as well as not being well adapted to local realities. Additionally, the speed with which gender equality ideas are expected to be adopted is seen as unrealistic. Not only must the concept be understood, but in order for changes to be effective, time must be allowed for people’s views and values to alter

The article also highlighted the need for women to be seen as agents of change in gender initiatives rather than objects of development. Women are told what equality is rather than being able to define it for themselves, which can result in further problems.

Whilst this article is relatively dated, a more recent book by Amutabi (2013) entitled ‘The NGO Factor in Africa: The Case of Arrested Development in Africa’ seems to reinforce these views seven years later. Amutabi discusses that some NGOs’ attempts to empower women have actually done the opposite and some women are actually content with the status quo as it is. Furthermore, their workshops were considered to be of little to no value and NGOs actually fuelled confusion and tension in the communities they became involved with.

Whilst these authors have discussed female empowerment in general in Africa, as opposed to in direct relation to water issues, they have demonstrated that the implementation of gender mainstreaming is not straight forward. Female empowerment is still crucial and has been found to have various widespread benefits, but, as mentioned in a previous post, we cannot assume that this is an outright solution. In fact, there is great complexity across time and space and so each context must be considered carefully and individually in order for any objectives to be successfully achieved. Female empowerment cannot just be forced on all communities in Africa in the hope that this will solve issues such as those related to water. Again, the local community must be consulted and considered when trying to improve or change any current situation.

References

Amutabi, M. (2006). The NGO factor in Africa. 1st ed. New York: Routledge.

Wendoh, S., & Wallace, T. (2005). Re-thinking gender mainstreaming in African NGOs and communities. Gender & Development, 13(2), 70-79.

Sanitation

On the day of writing this post (the 19th of November 2016), it is annual ‘World Toilet Day’, first established in 2013 by the UN General Assembly. The theme of this year’s event was to focus on ‘how sanitation, or the lack of it, can impact on livelihoods’ (http://www.worldtoiletday.info/theme/). 

There has also been a stress placed this year on the need to invest in toilets in workplaces and schools so that women and girls have separate facilities in order to maintain their dignity and manage menstruation or pregnancy safely. This can apparently boost the ‘girl effect’ which involves maximising the involvement of half the population in society.

Sanitation is an important concept in relation to water issues and undoubtedly affects women and girls, particularly in relation to menstruation and shared facilities. For women in various parts of the global South, cultural norms combined with the desire to maintain privacy mean that women feel they can only relieve themselves under cover of darkness. This can put women at risk of scorpion or snake bites and also leaves women vulnerable to attacks or rape due to the predictability of their movements (Jewitt, 2011). Amnesty International has reported that women and girls in Nairobi’s slums are often too scared to leave their houses to use the communal toilet due to risk of attack. Some women actually feel it is safer to defecate in a plastic bag than go out to shared toilets at night due to the risks they may face. 

Furthermore, water.org emphasises the problem of school toilets as some schools have no toilets available or do not provide separate toilets for girls meaning that many girls drop out of school once they reach puberty. This perpetuates gender inequality issues as well as poverty according to WASH Advocates.

WASH Advocates further state that women and girls may be choosing to ignore their needs because of a culmination of the issues stated above and so their likelihood of developing urinary tract infections, chronic constipation or mental stress may be increased. 

A recurring conclusion in much of the academic literature, ‘grey’ literature and websites I have read in regard to all the themes I have previously discussed, is the need for female empowerment as a solution to water issues. Sanitation is no different as women’s participation can increase the effectiveness of water and sanitation management schemes as well as the sustainability of these projects. School attendance can be increased as the need for separate toilet facilities are acknowledged which can, in turn, improve gender equality issues as a whole. Ultimately, women’s voices and concerns must be heard in order for water and sanitation issues, that are currently affecting them so negatively, to be addressed. 

References

Jewitt, S. 2011. Geographies of shit: Spatial and temporal variations in attitudes towards human waste. Progress in Human Geography 35, 608–626.

https://www.amnesty.org/en/press-releases/2010/07/17350/ 

http://water.org/water-crisis/womens-crisis/

http://www.washadvocates.org/learn/wash-and-women-and-girls/

http://www.worldtoiletday.info/theme/

The Dangers of Ecofeminism

Last week, those registered on the Water and Development in Africa course at UCL took part in a role playing seminar. Here, we took on the roles of many different groups affected by the Komadugu-Yobe River Basin. Those acting as the Association of Kano River Irrigation Project (KRIP) Farmers mentioned the work of Jackson in relation to ideas of female empowerment.

Having read the paper ‘Doing What Comes Naturally? Women and Environment in Development’ (Jackson, 1993), I have been forced to consider the idea of female empowerment in relation to ecofeminism and the damaging assumptions that can be made. Though this paper is quite dated now, it does demonstrate the issues associated with assuming women are natural conservationists. I myself have stated in previous posts that women face a greater number of issues relating to water and water management in Africa, but it is important to remember that this does not necessarily mean that women therefore have a greater interest in protecting the environment. Ultimately, the relationship between women and the environment cannot be thought of as in isolation from men’s relationship with the environment as women do not have a particular instinctive closeness to their environment (Jackson, 1993: 1959).

Another problem with the assumptions that ‘Ecofeminist’ and ‘Women, Development and Environment’ literatures can make is that women are somehow homogenous in their attitudes towards the environment across the world. Actually, it is necessary ‘to locate environmental attitudes within particular economies’ (Jackson, 1993: 1949). In fact, Jackson cites two studies that actually demonstrate that women cannot be characterised as inherently environmentally friendly. One study in Kenya (Gould, 1992) describes an area of high male emigration and suggests women can then be successful environmental managers as they are able to impart their knowledge. However, a study in Tanzania (Eele et al., 1992) found male farmers were more likely to make a ‘conservation investment’ than female farmers. Not only do women not experience environmental degradation in a uniform manner, but their attitudes are also not the same across the globe (Jackson, 1993: 1949).

In a more recent paper ‘Environmental Ethics’ by Palmer (2014), the section on ecofeminism further highlights this criticism of the link between women and nature. Palmer suggests that interpretations of ecofeminism have had to be expanded to include oppressions of class and race as previous ideas of ecofeminism were too limiting. This critique also demonstrates this idea that women cannot be assumed to be natural protectors of the environment and that actually, these sorts of discourses, expressed by bodies such as NGOs, can be just as damaging.

Therefore, though women in Africa face a great number of problems in relation to water issues which are no doubt caused by inherent inequalities, we cannot then assume that they will be the natural constituency for conservation activities as actually, women too can be agents of environmental degradation (Jackson, 1993: 1952). In a later blog post, I will discuss the importance of female empowerment in creating successful water management schemes. Therefore, this post has been a preface to my later post to draw attention to the fact that though I believe female empowerment to be necessary for successful water management schemes to be achieved, I am not assuming that female empowerment will automatically lead to environmental solutions because women are somehow natural protectors, but rather that their experiences and knowledge can only aid water management schemes as more views are considered and more stakeholders are represented.

References

Eele, G., et al. (1992). Environmental change and the response by small-holder famers: some evidence from Tanzania. Paper given at the Annual Conference of the British Society for Population Studies, Exeter College (Oxford, September 9-11).

Gould, B. (1992). Population growth, environmental stability and migration in Western Province, Kenya. Paper given at the Annual Conference of the British Society for Population Studies, Exeter College (Oxford: September 9-11).

Jackson, C. (1993). Doing what comes naturally? Women and environment in development. World Development, 21(12), 1947-1963.

Palmer, C., McShane, K., & Sandler, R. (2014). Environmental Ethics. Annual Review of Environment and Resources, 39, 419-442.

It's Not All Doom and Gloom

A comment on my second post, relating to female farmers, asked me to consider countries outside of the African continent in order to compare any issues or solutions raised for women in agriculture in other parts of the world. This could then provide some insight into what the future might hold for women in Africa.

The article provided by Baljeet Lakhan (the commenter) (Paul, 2012) examined women farmers in India and their unequal treatment. This has resulted in their exclusion from discussions and workshops organised by the local council that exist to provide farmers with information about new agricultural schemes as well as to train them and provide them with the skills to carry out more innovative methods of farming.

Clearly, the situation described in India is not too different from that in Africa. However, the story is not all doom and gloom, as in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh in India, over one million women living in 8,000 villages are earning a living under the Community Managed Sustainable Agriculture programme. The primary purpose of this programme was to eliminate poverty, but they have also aided in the reclamation of thousands of acres of degraded land.

Additionally, the personal experience of Sujathamma Begary demonstrates the programme’s success in improving the position of female farmers as this woman is now the co-owner of a three acre farm with four other neighbours and is now formally recognised as a farmer. This programme demonstrates the success that female empowerment can bring when women are included in discussions of agriculture, and by extension, water management issues.

Perhaps a similar programme could be established in many regions of Africa where female farmers are experiencing problems as a result of inequality. In fact, according to an article in the Cornell University Chronicle (Hautea, 2016) the UN even dedicated October 15th of this year as the International Day of Rural Women where the contribution of rural women around the world was recognised for enhancing agriculture as well as improving food security.

The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the UN has even suggested that by giving women farmers equal access to training, knowledge and finance, productivity could be increased by around 30%. Female empowerment will not only benefit women, but men also (Hautea, 2016). 

For Sub-Saharan Africa in particular, the Gender-responsive Researchers Equipped for Agricultural Transformation project team seeks to improve the lives of farmers by increasing gender equality. Their goal is for agricultural practitioners and scientists to improve the productivity and livelihoods of smallholder farmers by bringing ‘gender responsiveness’ to their work (Hautea, 2016).

Furthermore, the Next Generation of Cassava Breeding project, aims to ensure that the needs of women are considered as, in this case, men and women usually prefer different properties in the crops they consume and grow. This project hopes to use innovative technologies to breed cassava varieties that are useful to both men and women (Hautea, 2016).

Hopefully, this post reveals the potential for a positive future with regard to female farmers in Africa as their opinions, knowledges and experiences are increasingly being considered and used to establish more successful practices and improvements within agriculture. Whilst this post has considered female farmers in particular, it is worth remembering how crucial water is for agricultural practices and so how important the empowerment of female farmers is when tackling water issues.

References:

Hautea, S., 2016. Programs empower women farmers around the world. Cornell Chronicle. Online:  http://news.cornell.edu/stories/2016/10/programs-empower-women-farmers-around-world [Accessed 2/11/16].

Paul, S., 2012. Inequality deepens climate challenge for India’s women farmers. Thomson Reuters Foundation News. Online: http://news.trust.org//item/20121030094100-ik53r/ [Accessed 2/11/16].

Shouldering the Burden

A post from last October entitled ‘It is not a man's job to fetch water’ on the blog ‘Survival, Safety, Security: Gender vs. Water and Sanitation in Africa’s Informal Settlements’ written by Matita Afoakwa (http://reflectingongendervswater.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/less-than-20-of-seats-in-national.html) includes an illustration showing women carrying water while a group of men sit and discuss water management and issues of water. The women are clearly not involved in the discussion. Beneath the illustration, the caption reads ‘Less than 20% of seats in national parliament are held by women’. Afoakwa concludes that this picture is accurate as it reflects ignorant attitudes towards water management.

Clearly women in Africa do shoulder the majority of the burden of collecting water. Furthermore, they are excluded from major discussions of water management as are many different types of stakeholders. Without proper representation of the whole community, or more often several communities, water management schemes cannot be effective as voices and opinions are excluded.

An example of how greater understanding of the needs of stakeholders is required is shown in a study by Osman Bah in Sierre Leone. This was undertaken as part of the International Drinking Water Decade (1981-1999) set up at the 1977 UN ‘Water Conference’ at Mar del Plata. The aim was improve the water supply to rural areas by improving wells. After 1520 improved wells were built, Bah returned to the site and surveyed the water usage in this area. He found that only 10% of village water and 1-12% of farm water actually came from these improved wells. 74% of drinking water actually came from traditional sources such as open wells or swamp pits. The failure of this scheme came down to a lack of understanding about the position of the wells as all the farms in the area were remote from the village where the new wells were situated meaning the farmers had to travel to reach this improved supply. Furthermore, for women, the improved wells were largely felt to be unnecessary as the new location of the wells within the village meant that their conversations could now be overheard when collecting water, whereas before the wells were situated outside the village, giving the women a chance to talk openly together (Bah, 2016).

This scheme failed as there was a lack of recognition of how water was used and, as is almost always the case, women were among those affected. Whilst it is generally accepted that cutting down the time it takes for women to collect water is necessary, it is important to assess each case individually and acknowledge the opinions of those affected in order to achieve the most successful outcome.

For women, the problem extends beyond risks and issues when collecting water to those women who live in communities with limited access to water. In these areas, women are more at risk of blindness by infection from trachoma (http://www.gender.cawater-info.net/what_is/facts_e.htm).

As women face an acute number of issues relating to water, they should be involved in discussions of water management. Their personal experiences and knowledge would only enhance the effectiveness of any water management scheme and cannot be underestimated. Therefore, I do agree with Afoakwa that the illustration she used shows the ignorance of water management discussions as these can only be described as limited without the involvement of all stakeholders.

References:

Bah, O. (1986). The socio-economic impact of improved well water supplies in Sierra Leone.

http://www.gender.cawater-info.net/what_is/facts_e.htm

http://reflectingongendervswater.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/less-than-20-of-seats-in-national.html

Female Farmers

This week, I will be discussing smallholder female farmers and groundwater irrigation issues that affect them.

Women farmers can benefit from groundwater irrigation, however, they traditionally have no right to inherit land. This puts them in a disadvantaged position due to lack of land tenure and it also makes it difficult for female farmers to obtain loans and thereby equipment for irrigation (Villholth, 2013: 381).

Furthermore, female-headed households tend to have smaller plots of land available to irrigate. This means that manual methods for lifting water are often common and women tend to have a smaller labour force available than a male-headed household. This is generally due to the fact that female-headed households are usually smaller (Villholth, 2013: 381). 

As they are disproportionately responsible for household chores, women also have less time available for agricultural activities than men (Van Koppen, 2013: 841), which, overall, means that female farmers are at a distinct disadvantage and face great difficulties due to the unequal experiences they have.

There is already evidence available indicating that in grant schemes where women are favoured, the overall communities benefit (Villholth, 2013) 381). However, an article by Van Koppen et al., (2013) states that it is not yet clear whether closing the gender gap would aid the achievement of water-policy goals or hinder it. Their argument is that as men are often assumed to be better technology adopters, efforts to provide equal opportunities to men and women could actually reduce the possible success of only targeting men (Van Koppen et al., 2013: 840).

However, the same study does mention that there is research showing women in rural Africa are as productive as men and so this particular study concluded that women are proactive irrigation adopters despite the difficulties they face. Furthermore, Van Koppen et al.’s paper suggests that by removing gender-specific issues, water policy makers would aid more efficient water management by helping all small-holder farmers, female and male, and encourage more groundwater irrigation at these small-holder farms, as well as addressing the gender-policy goals of that particular country at the same time (Van Koppen et al., 2013: 850).

As will be discussed in a later week, empowering women in all aspects of water management has shown to be incredibly effective, and groundwater irrigation has been no different. It is my opinion that gender equality must not be ignored in the improvement of water management.

References:
Van Koppen, B., Hope, L., & Colenbrander, W. (2013). Gender aspects of smallholder private groundwater irrigation in Ghana and Zambia. Water International, 38(6), 840-851.

Villholth, K., 2013. Groundwater irrigation for smallholders in Sub-Saharan Africa - a synthesis of current knowledge to guide sustainable outcomes. Water International, Vol. 38, 369-391

Introduction

There is a growing volume of literature suggesting women and men often have disparate relationships to water access, knowledge, governance, uses and experiences in Africa. This could be due to gendered labour practices, socio-economic factors and/or intersectional differences such as income (Harris et al., 2016:1). Issues of water in Africa are therefore inextricably linked with issues of gender. 

Consequently, the posts on this blog throughout the following months will discuss issues of gender in relation to water throughout Africa, highlighting problems that both men and women face respectively. Topics will include issues related specifically to groundwater, agriculture and the collection of water as well as sanitation. There will be a focus on women’s issues in particular and this first post will outline the primary reasons as to why women are disproportionately impacted by water related issues in Africa and therefore why assessing water issues in Africa from the perspective of gender is so important.

Women and children are primarily responsible for the collection of water across Africa. This reduces the time women and children have available to engage in other activities such as generating income and attending school (Graham et al., 2016:3).

Girls often have to drop out of school to help out at home or because there are no separate toilet facilities which can guarantee them privacy. This is particularly important once they reach puberty. In fact, women and girls are often made to feel uncomfortable relieving themselves during the day (water.org, 2016) due to lack of access to toilets and so have to wait until nightfall, which can put them at risk of physical attack and sexual violence. Furthermore, traveling long distances to collect water in the day can also leave women and girls at risk of danger even in daylight (Graham et al., 2016:3).

Women are also primarily responsible for the management of domestic water use as they clean, cook and wash. Despite this, they are rarely consulted or involved in the planning and management of water. Women also play a dominant role in agricultural activities, though again they often experience problems due to limited access to land (Baker et al., 2015: 325). There is in fact evidence to show that gender equality and female empowerment are crucial for improving a country’s economy and considering water is essential to all economic activities, ensuring women have access and are involved in the decision-making process of water resource management is essential (Abrahams et al., 2010: 78). This will be discussed in greater detail in another blog post.

Therefore, issues of gender clearly need to be considered when discussing water issues or implementing any water resource management schemes, as this blog will discuss.

References:

Abrahams, Y., Mhlongo, S., & Napo, V. (2011). A gendered analysis of water and sanitation services policies and programmes in South Africa: 2006 – 2010. Agenda, 25(2), 71-79.

Baker, Cullen, Debevec, & Abebe. (2015). A socio-hydrological approach for incorporating gender into biophysical models and implications for water resources research. Applied Geography, 62, 325-338.

Graham, J., Hirai, M., Kim, S., & Vitzthum, V. (2016). An Analysis of Water Collection Labor among Women and Children in 24 Sub-Saharan African Countries. PLoS ONE, 11(6), PLoS ONE, 2016, Vol.11(6).

Harris, L., Kleiber, D., Goldin, J., Darkwah, A., & Morinville, C. (2016). Intersections of gender and water: Comparative approaches to everyday gendered negotiations of water access in undeserved areas of Accra, Ghana and Cape Town, South Africa. Journal of Gender Studies, 1-22.

Water.org. (2016). Women and Water: The Role of Gender & The Water Shortage, Water.org. [online] Available at: http://water.org/water-crisis/women-crisis/ [Accessed 13 Oct. 2016].