How A Single Drop for Safe Water Came to Be
The Philippines is a middle income country and there are no widespread chronic water shortages. However many of its residents do not have access to WaSH services. Deficiencies in support for WaSH and poor access are seen both as manifestations of poverty and as factors that worsen it. WaSH can also be a factor in conflict. A Single Drop for Safe Water (
ASDSW) has identified key issues that it addresses within its programs: 1) The governance of WaSH services is fragmented throughout the government system, particularly at the local level and; 2) Community demand for improved WaSH services is often ineffective. These two (2) issues create a relationship where limited demand from the community reinforces limited response and accountability from government. Limited demand for service delivery reduces the need for technical and financial resources, limited resources results in low WaSH service delivery, hence the community does not see the impact of good WaSH service delivery and hence does not demand improvements. In addition to this the Philippines is one of the more disaster prone countries, which puts further pressure on government WaSH service delivery. It used its founders’, governing Board’s and staff’s years of experience and a culture of innovation to evolve its programmatic approach to address these issues: 1) Demand and capacity creation within poor and conflict-affected communities, making WaSH a peace and development effort; 2) Creation of structures and development planning capacity to create direction, structure and accountability within local governments and communities; 3) Developing technical capacity and governance capacity to plan, mobilize resources, implement and manage/maintain this WaSH service capacity in a manner that is resilient to disruptions; 4) Implementation of humanitarian response for WaSH in such a way as to increase the capacity of those affected and to springboard into long-term development.
- See more at: http://www.singledrop.org/our-story/ .3T3HaU0z.dpuf
