Development Aspects Impressum Editors

Social inclusiveness

This approach is based on the understanding that women and men have different interests, needs and tasks in their use of water and sanitation facilities. This means that they have different knowledge, insights and requirements for skills. In poor urban areas, traditionally women and girls are more affected by inadequate access to water as they have the core responsibility of collecting water and taking care of the household’s sanitation such as the disposal of solid waste and human wastes. The equal participation of women and men is critical to the efficiency, success and sustainability of water and sanitation services. Special attention is not only necessary for poor women, but also for other vulnerable groups that abound in the project towns such as those affected by HIV/AIDS, households headed by orphans or grandparents, physically disabled persons, albinos, orphans and the institutions that cater for these groups. This insight would need to be mainstreamed through- out the capacity development interventions by using an approach that promotes gender equity and provides for vulnerable groups.

3. Integrated approaches and solutions

The project takes place at a point in time when the three East African countries are implementing significant water sector reforms directed at improving water govern- ance and water services delivery. Invariably, these reforms embrace decentraliza- tion and devolution and have thus created huge capacity demands at the level of the local stakeholders, in areas such as governance, resource mobilization, man- agement, negotiation, gender mainstreaming, equitable access, social inclusion and local economic development. The contribution to be made by the project has to be seen in the context of these reforms, and was designed to focus on specific themes: pro-poor governance, water, sanitation and solid waste management, lo- cal economic development, gender mainstreaming and the inclusion of vulnerable groups. These themes promote the active participation of the urban poor in the planning, implementation, monitoring and management of proposed interven- tions; support local government and others to create an enabling environment for development; improve the efficiency and effectiveness of water and sanitation service provision and solid waste management and ensure financial sustainability; create economic opportunities to develop market goods and services associated with improved access to and quality of water and sanitation services and solid waste management; facilitate equal participation of women and men and a gender equity approach; and ensure attention for vulnerable groups to include those with least access to services and with a lack of opportunities to empower themselves.

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