Operation, maintenance and sustainability of services for the urban poor

A new project funded by the Department for International Development (DFID) Infrastructure and Urban Development Department

Project Team:

Project Management by WEDC, Loughborough University, UK.

Project Purpose:
Improved sustainability of urban services in poor communities, through the use of an appropriate management framework and supporting tools by external support agencies, urban government and NGOs.

Project Duration:
April 1999 - March 2002.

Why are we doing this project?
Many urban service improvements projects promote community participation in planning, implementation and management of the services. Increased participation in O&M is assumed but is as yet unproven. It is essential to review both consumer(urban poor) perceptions and municipal performance of O&M, including the sustainability of the community based processes. The actual and potential roles and responsibilities for O&M between communities, municipalities and intermediaries have to be more clearly understood in order to develop sound guidance for programmes leading to sustainable services for the urban poor. Otherwise investments in capital infrastructure and community development will not realize anticipated benefits. This work will develop a management framework, tools and guidance for improved 0&M performance.

Focus of the Project:
The key question to be addressed is how to improve the performance and sustainability of the O&M services for the urban the poor. The work will centre on exploration of relationships(contracts), roles and responsibilities in the context of urban services projects.

What we propose to do:
The project will carry out a series of case studies involving completed urban projects to investigate the performance of O&M, relationships(contracts) among the stakeholders, roles and responsibilities, and consumers satisfaction. These cases will investigate both successes and failures. A key feature of this work is the prominent role which our Southern partners will play in the planning, implementation and analysis of the case study material which forms the basis for developing the project outputs. The lessons learned will be developed into guiding principles.

Where we will be working:
The focus is quite wide in that it will include relevant experience from countries in South Asia: India, Pakistan and Sri-Lanka.

What the work will produce
The following are the proposed outputs

Spreading the word:
Outputs to be published in UK and South Asia. Primary dissemination via: local partners networks; UNDP regional water & sanitation programme office Delhi with whom we will hold a regional workshop; WHO O&M network (300 members worldwide); UNICEF WES country offices; relevant DFID Newsletters and websites; GARNET applied research networks. We will focus on electronic dissemination: outputs mounted on the GARNET (10000 visits per month) & WHO home pages; UNICEF intra-net. Links from other key pages e.g. ‘AfricaWater’ will be established. We will manage an email conference on the project outputs modeled on recent successful experiments. Subsequent secondary dissemination may include translation by local publishers.

To find out more, please contact:
Dr. M.Sohail,
WEDC,
Loughborough University,
Leicestershire,
LE11 3TU,
UK

Tel: +44 1509 222885
Fax: +44 1509 211079
Email:  M.Sohail@lboro.ac.uk

Updated 31/01/03

Maintained by f.o.odhiambo@lboro.ac.uk and j.fisher1@lboro.ac.uk