Development in Africa: Water and Gender

In the last entry, I uncovered the effectiveness of Coca-Cola's water initiative on providing wash services to people and alleviating inequalities between men and women. As previously mentioned, they appeared to have success when incorporating women in water management and decision making – thus begging the question, is female participation the way forward? Spoiler alert: Yes. Incorporating women in the decision-making process is logical and makes sense. As we know from one of my earlier entries, women already collect water and use it for household uses like cooking and cleaning and are the decision-makers in the household – so why would this not extend outwards into local and national policy? Through making, women agents of change in water management and decision making can then allow them to lead fulfilled lives in which they are able to engage in economic, social and political activities, thus enabling the development of the communities they are in. Additionally, water projects ...

Welcome back! Reflecting on my blog entries so far, I have explored how women have been disproportionally affected by the lack of readily available water resources. As a follow up to that, I aim to look at one of the largest initiatives by Coca-Cola that have been implemented to lessen the burden women have to face. In exploring this, I aim to interrogate their successes especially in female participation, whilst ultimately concluding that neo-colonial forms of development can be problematic . RAIN (Replenish Africa Initiative) by Coca-Cola Coca-Cola is one of the largest private employers in Africa and has set out to replenish Africa through community-specific initiatives to improve WaSH and other water infrastructures. I ask myself, why would Coca-Cola want to improve wash facilities for women in Africa – aren’t they a massive corporation with other things to worry about? – well, I’ll get to that. They have successfully been able to invest almost $30 million to implement initiatives...

Welcome back to this 2-part series! In the first part, I considered how a lack of WaSH facilities had consequences on MHM and period poverty and the ways in which these could be alleviated. In this post, I aim to look at other impacts WaSH has had on women such as gender-based violence (GBV) and education attainment as a response to poor WaSH facilities.  Before I begin, I want to make it clear that gender-based violence and poor educational attainment are issues that can be found globally and are not exclusive to Africa . The case is that these can be exacerbated due to a lack of WaSH facilities in Africa. Also, these issues can sometimes be a response to poor MHM, thus showing how cumulative these problems really are.  GBV in relation to WaSH  GBV is violence inflicted on another person based on their gender and can be both physical and psychological. Fragmented access to water puts women in particular at great risk. Studies in refugee camps in Kenya have found that i...

My next entry will be on the topic that interests me most within the theme of water and gender in Africa – WaSH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) and the impact this has had on MHM (Menstrual Health Management) and period poverty. I will be contextualising this problem by looking at the causes of poor WaSH facilities and the implications this has had. in the context of MHM As WaSH is an extensive topic, this will act as a 2-part series.  Poor access to WaSH facilities disproportionally affects women in many countries in Africa which consequently causes problems with MHM. As a result, period poverty has become a prevalent issue as women are unable to access sanitation facilities that allow them to manage their periods effectively. A lack of WaSH facilities is more so a problem in informal settlements and is often routed in lack of regulations and funds to be able to provide appropriate sanitation infrastructures e.g a toilet, clean water and sanitary towels. Subsequently, women are ...

Welcome back to my blog. Following on from last week’s entry and how water scarcity disadvantages women more so than men, I want to build on that notion by particularly looking at the journey women of all ages and young men face in water collection. There will be a particular emphasis on a rural locality in the developing country of Uganda and forms of alleviating this.  We know that water is not unanimously distributed within each country , resulting from different levels of poor water governance, physical factors as well as cultural social norms. Looking more so at the cultural norms for the rest of the blog, it can be the case where women throughout their lifetimes carry the burden of having to collect the water . I call it a burden, as their journey consists of a long walk, carrying heavy bottles of water, and being subject to many injustices and dangers, which will be discussed later on in this entry.  Delving into the case of Uganda , it is a country that is deemed water...

Welcome back! In this entry, I will go into further detail about the water situation at hand by exploring water scarcity and groundwater and the different ways in which men and women interact with this water resource. I hope to capture the essence of how complex this premise is.  Water’s importance in the development of communities is undeniable. Often time in we forget its significance as it is such a readily available resource in the UK for the most part. But, this forgetfulness doesn’t apply to every country. Water can be a source of conflict and inequality in countries where there is water scarcity, with some of those places being situated in some countries in Africa.  As mentioned before, Africa’s water situation is a case of distribution rather than supply . In this, water scarcity metrics have been devised and updated in order to conceptualise the differential access to water among the countries in Africa. The most commonly used metric is the WSI as established by Falke...

Welcome to my first blog entry! Over the next few months, I aim to examine the complex link between water, gender and development in Africa. What drew me to this theme was the opportunity to examine the inequality women have faced with such an integral part of life and development – water , to understand why this inequality exists and what is being done to eradicate it. My interest also stems from being female myself. To begin, my first post aims to provide some initial context on Africa and how we write about it, as well as the link between water, gender and development.  Africa: Context and Portrayals Europe’s undeniable influence on the continent of Africa has had a significant impact on part of its history over the past few centuries. Colonialism during the Scramble for Africa, the slave trade and continued exploitation echoes through the development issues in the present day . Subsequently, when Europeans have spoken about Africa in literature and film, it seems to be framed a...