Dry Taps and Thirsty Nairobians. How Strong is Water Inequality in the Kenya’s Capital.
Water and Sanitation in Nairobi face problem common to many cities of the developing world which grow too fast.
The water supply is unable to meet fast growing demand. It is unreliable even to the small majority who has direct connection to tapped water.
For those who cannot get enough, reliance on alternative unregulated service suppliers is a necessity, but these practice prices which are much higher than the legal rate. For those with the means, investment in storage tanks helps harvesting more water at the expense of everyone else in the community.
This situation allows the stark differences in socio-economic between the wealthy and the poor to translate into unequal and inequitable consumption of the available water.
“My interest is in feeding my children. Masks are not basic needs, food and shelter are. I’ll hustle for food, shelter and clothing rather than face masks. Also in this neighborhood, high percentage of youths is jobless,” claims Andrew Mmanyi, Youth Leader-Kibera.
So, how deep is the gap between the serviced and the water-starved and how strong is water inequality in Nairobi? What are the roots of the water problem and its availability? Is it fairly shared, and by which mechanisms?
Behind this situation are several causes, each of them is part of a complex system of interactions of technical, economic and political factors.
Like many African countries, Kenya's rapidly growing capital city is facing severe problems with the supply and quality of its water supply, driving people to buy it from unsafe and potentially contaminated sources.
With the COVID-19 pandemic, the need for water has increased, as more people are encouraged to wash their hands regularly to limit the spread of the virus.
Regular hand-washing with soap and running water is recommended by the World Health Organization as one of the best ways to prevent the spread of COVID-19. However it is difficult for most city residents to put this into practice due to lack of water, especially in slums.
In a televised interview with a leading media house in Kenya, a year ago, Nahashon Muguna, the head of the Nairobi City Water and Sewerage Company (NCWSC), expressed serious concerns about the pace of improvements to the water supply in the face of a rapidly growing population over the past few decades.
According to United Nations, more than 90 percent of the population in Kenya's urban areas had access to clean water in 1990. Now, it is estimated that just 50 percent of Nairobi's four and a half million residents have direct access to piped water.
Therefore, is water inequity in Nairobi planned for or there by default?
It is estimated that 40 percent of the distributed water is supplied to the 7 percent biggest consumers and the 45 percent smallest consumers share 15 percent of water available. In other terms it seems that in Nairobi, the wealthy have such a demand that it creates a water shortage of which the cost is mainly born by the less privileged people.
There is currently about a 25 percent shortfall in supply to Nairobi homes, according to the city's water provider, NCWSC.
While at the global level about 1 billion people are locked out of having access to safe water due to poverty, inequality and government failure, it is also clear that not having access to clean water is a main driver of poverty and inequality.
Nearly 300 million people in Sub- Saharan Africa live in water stressed environment. This presents a major challenge towards controlling the spread of COVID-19.
Also, the continent will need to invest massively in the water and sanitation sectors over the next 10 year in order to meet Sustainable Development Goal 6.
Hence it is vital for Kenyan government to put strategies in place, earmark part of their budget, and develop policies to supply water, sanitation, and hygiene services for its entire people.
Adopting efficient water demand management framework and a real pro-poor water tariff will allow the poor to get their share which can lower the high consumers demand, discourage wasteful use of water and allows more water to be tapped to the poor.
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