Contribution to international development report: 2018-2019

Chapter Eight: Climate Justice Fund – Water Futures

8.1 Introduction

There is also a third stream to the CJF, namely the Water Futures Programme in Malawi. This is managed by the Water Industry Team, through the Scotland: The HydroNation Budget.

In Malawi, around 1.7 million people do not have access to safe water, 10 million people do not have access to adequate sanitation and over 300,000 children under the age of five die each year from diarrhoeal diseases caused by unsafe water and poor sanitation. A safe and effective water infrastructure is the keystone in helping people to stay healthy and, in turn, gain education, start businesses, create employment and grow economies. Investing in water and sewage, while considering how key aspects of development can be used to help address gender inequality, promises to be an important bridge from poverty to wealth for Malawi.

8.2 Climate Justice Fund: Water Futures Programme

8.2.1. Background

The Scottish Government is collaborating with the Government of Malawi, academic institutions, and Non-Governmental Organisations in the development of a programme of integrated water resource management (IWRM) in Malawi. Together, the aim is to make SDG 6: Access to Clean Water and Sanitation, a reality in Malawi by enabling national water access and adequate waste-water management.

1 No Poverty

3 Good Health and Well-Being

4 Quality Education

5 Gender Equality

6 Clean Water and Sanitation

9 Industry Innovation and Infrastructure

10 Reduced Inequalities

13 Climate Action

16 Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions

8.2.2. The Project

The Water Futures Programme aims to:

• map and condition survey all the water and sanitation points across the whole of Malawi;
• support the Government of Malawi in building capacity in the environmental and economic regulation for the water industry; and
• build capacity across all levels of Government in Malawi, leading to good policy making and enhanced investment targeting and specification.

8.2.3. Contribution to Development 2018–2019

The work of the CJF: Water Futures Programme focuses on four key areas: Asset Management and Data Collection; Capacity Building and Training; Policy Support; and Research and Knowledge Exchange.

By June 2019, the Programme had mapped and condition surveyed approximately 70% of all of Malawi’s water and sanitation assets.

Once the research is complete, the Malawian Government will be able to accurately prioritise their investment in sanitation and water infrastructure.

The project is also forensically inspecting some of Malawi’s boreholes to identify candidates for refurbishment, re-drilling or closure.

The Programme has provided training and knowledge exchange in Malawi and in Scotland on borehole chemistry, governance and water resource management at all levels of the Malawian Government.

Mapping of a water facility on Chisi Island in Zomba District. Picture taken by United Purpose, implementing partner.

Key Programme activities are highlighted below:

• Asset Management and Data Collection (Mapping): The project is using the mWater Platform (a database that can clearly hold relevant data and produce management information reports) to map all water-related infrastructure across Malawi (surface water, groundwater, sanitation, waste etc.) as well as supporting drilling and forensic analysis for partner projects. The water point mapping project continues with approximately 70% of Malawi completed by June 2019. More than 83,000 water points and 217,000 sanitation points had been mapped across the country by the same point, with five remaining districts in the north and eight in the south due to complete over summer 2019. Currently, more than 150 Government of Malawi Staff are working in 13 districts. The Quality Assurance/Quality Control analysis of the data continues through a Call Centre overseen by the CJF, and is currently at >95% accuracy. New tools have been created to accurately monitor the progress. As a world’s first, a series of SDG6 indicators building on the WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme have been brought together by UNWater.org and combined in a new tool to track SDG6 performance; a linked decision support tool is being tested in selected areas.
• Capacity Building: Delivering training across all 28 districts in groundwater resources management, key technical skills for drilling oversight and hydrogeology for staff across every local government District Water Development Office and Malawi’s Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development. The project to analyse the main causes of failure in boreholes, for example poor historic drilling standards, lack of maintenance or water quality issues continues. This project, called Borehole Forensics, has also been used to train Malawian professionals in drilling supervision. Within this project, the CJF team has participated in drilling exercises in Balaka because of an emergency related with Mpira dam drying up where three boreholes were drilled by CJF staff within a Programme led by the Malawian Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development to try to alleviate the water crisis faced by that area.
• Policy Support: Sharing policy best practice with the Government of Malawi to assist the sustainable long-term management of the water resources in Malawi. As part of Scotland’s Hydro Nation initiative, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) has been working in partnership with Malawi’s National Water Resources Authority (NWRA) to support its establishment and operationalisation. Working ‘regulator to regulator’ has afforded the opportunity to share knowledge, advice and guidance from a unique perspective, setting sound foundations for 21st century environmental regulation in Malawi and ultimately, the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 6. The Government of Malawi has recently appointed the board members of the National Water Resources Authority (NWRA). This appointment could be considered the first important step forward towards the implementation of the NWRA since the Water Resources Act was passed in 2013. This implementation is the focus of the work SEPA is supporting within the CJF, and was presented in the NGO Accountability Conference organised by the Malawian Government, attended by all development partners and international NGOs.
• Research and Knowledge Exchange: Our academic partners are pursuing over 60 targeted research reports to fill key knowledge gaps for decision-making, as well as providing a distance learning MSc in Hydrogeology to support technical knowledge and capacity building in Malawi. Under the Scottish Government-funded Hydro Nation Scholars Programme, Scholar Robert Šakić Trogrlić is investigating Community Based, Non-Structural Flood Risk Management for Malawi recognising the critical role of communities in how we respond to flooding. Outputs from Robert’s work have helped inform the overarching project in Malawi with the full findings of his PhD project expected in autumn 2019.

8.2.4 Disaster Relief Support

Scotland also played a part in responding to the devastating floods that affected Malawi in early 2019 using the water point data gathered under the Water Futures project to identify water points and communities at most risk to help target urgent aid.

On 11 March 2019 the scale and impact of Flooding in Malawi was beginning to become clear. On 14 March 2019, the Scottish Government provided £225,00 in humanitarian funding to the Climate Justice Fund Water Futures Programme to support emergency flood relief in Malawi to deliver critical work to secure water supplies and treat contamination in the immediate aftermath of the disaster at over 200 Displacement Camps in Southern Malawi.

Across the affected districts a total of 396 boreholes and 81 protected shallow wells were reported to be damaged to varying extents. By using GIS data gathered under the Water Futures project to determine the extent of floods and by mWater Portal to locate water points and combining the two sets of data, 332 boreholes and 19 protected shallow wells were identified as likely to be contaminated and to require disinfection, a conclusion confirmed by a number of water quality tests. It was also determined that a significant number of hand-pumps have been inundated with silt and clay.

The use of this data contributed directly to the effective targeting of interventions such as chlorine treatment that can significantly reduce post flood sickness levels and was a key part of the emergency response.