Conference Agenda
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Daily Overview |
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Egg-Timer: Biodiversity and Human Well-Being Location: D-107 Session Chair: Mikołaj Czajkowski, University of Warsaw | |
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Alternative water use in promoting water, sanitation and hygiene among women in rural areas of Nigeria EfD Nigeria Water scarcity is a major problem in rural Nigeria, forcing women to spend considerable time collecting water for their families. The water sector reforms supported by national funding and international donors have not been able to solve the problem of water scarcity, which forces rural communities to use rainwater collection systems. This research investigates the factors influencing rural women to adopt rainwater harvesting systems and evaluates how this practice affects their empowerment in the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) sector. We collected primary data from 600 women from 30 rural communities through surveys conducted in Enugu and Anambra States. We developed a novel WASH Vulnerability Index (WVI), which is different from other WASH or empowerment indices. Previous indices focused on agency and or access, but WVI incorporates exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity to express women’s vulnerability to water and sanitation elements in a compounded measure. We use Propensity Score Matching (PSM) to determine how rainwater harvesting systems adoption affects WASH vulnerability levels. The research demonstrates that rainwater harvesting systems decrease water scarcity exposure while improving households' ability to adapt to water shortages, mainly for families without private boreholes or public water supply access. The adoption of RWH depends heavily on three factors, which include credit availability, water usage satisfaction and current water security levels. The availability of water through RWH systems decreases the time women spend collecting water, yet they continue to face elevated risks from poor sanitation conditions. The research demonstrates that RWH operates as a budget-friendly, sustainable solution which enhances rural water security while empowering women in their communities. It is recommended that, RWH programs be implemented within national WASH strategies and that delivering community-based training programs, combining RWH with sanitation and hygiene initiatives, will be beneficial | |