RWSN Country Information

Understanding climate processes is a crucial task for climate scientists looking to improve seasonal forecasts in the Horn of Africa, a region affected by severe droughts. The strength of the Turkana Jet – a wind feature which carries water vapour from the Indian Ocean across East Africa to Central Africa – is underestimated in current weather and climate models. New observations of the jet by researchers from the Kenya Met Department, the University of Nairobi and the University of Oxford have been used as a benchmark for UK Met Office forecasting models for East Africa. This work is providing much-needed evidence to improve current modelling and predictions, which will support policy and practice for governments and donors in the region.

In 2016, a results-based funding model was developed to improve the reliability of rural drinking water supply services in Kenya. The Water Services Maintenance Trust Fund (WSMTF) has tested a professional service delivery model in two counties and attracted new sources of results-based funds to guarantee water services in rural communities.

The WSMTF provides an example of how the funding gap can be met by non-donor funds in results-based contracts. In 2017, donor funds paid for 81% of WSMTF contracts, by 2021, the donor proportion had fallen to 14%. In the same period, the annual WSMTF resources increased from just under USD 50,000 to over USD 150,000.

The WSMTF has informed the work of the Uptime Catalyst Facility which has issued results-based contracts guaranteeing reliable drinking water for over 4 million rural people in 12 countries in 2023.

Uganda is a young, fast-growing, and rapidly urbanizing country: 45 percent of the population is under 15, the urbanization rate is 5.6 percent per annum, and gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in 2021 was $884. The country’s Human Development Index (HDI) is 0.525, ranking 166th among 191 countries.

The 1995 Constitution defines clean and safe water as a fundamental right for all Ugandans and divides responsibilities for water service provision between the national government and the 146 district local governments.

According to the World Health Organization/United Nations Children’s Fund’s Joint Monitoring Program, Uganda’s water services have improved substantially over the past 20 years: in 2020, 83 percent of Ugandan households accessed piped water or improved groundwater, compared to 61 percent in 2000. However, according to Uganda’s Ministry of Water and Environment, household water access has remained between 65–69 percent since 2010.

Domestic/municipal and agricultural uses exert the most demand on Uganda’s abundant surface water while drinking water utilizes groundwater primarily. Annual surface water and groundwater abstraction rates will likely remain well below levels that would threaten sustainable utilization thresholds. However, climate change, increased frequency of extreme weather events, and the fast-growing urban population could exacerbate water resource and water infrastructure management challenges.

This product was developed by USAID’s Rural Evidence and Learning For Water (REAL-WATER) Activity.

This report, developed by USAID’s REAL-Water initiative, synthesizes a desk review of emerging trends in rural water services delivery, with a focus on 12 countries (Ghana, India, Kenya, Mali, Mozambique, Peru, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, the Philippines, Uganda, and Zambia), drawn from the United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) 2021 list of high-priority, priority, and strategically aligned countries. It also maps water service delivery across an array of categories (including institutional and legal arrangements, regulation, monitoring, technical capacities, and financial capacities) and reports on an e-survey conducted among 400 respondents in the rural water supply sector.

Achieving national level systems change is usually the result of years of collaborative engagement and advocacy by like-minded people and organizations, using a variety of tactics and soft skills and putting in time and effort to bring it about. This paper documents five stories of change from Cambodia, Ethiopia, Honduras, Malawi, and Uganda based on interviews with a change maker from each country. Each story provides a personal account of what happened, challenges encountered along the way, and the tactics, soft skills and resourcing that helped to achieve it.

Lograr el cambio de los sistemas a nivel nacional suele ser el resultado de años de compromiso y defensa colaborativos por parte de personas y organizaciones con ideas afines, que utilizan diversas tácticas y habilidades blandas y dedican tiempo y esfuerzo para conseguirlo. Este documento documenta cinco historias de cambio de Camboya, Etiopía, Honduras, Malawi y Uganda basadas en entrevistas con un agente de cambio de cada país. Cada historia ofrece un relato personal de lo sucedido, los retos encontrados en el camino y las tácticas, las aptitudes interpersonales y los recursos que ayudaron a lograrlo.

Le changement des systèmes au niveau national est généralement le résultat d'années d'engagement collaboratif et de plaidoyer de la part de personnes et d'organisations partageant les mêmes idées, utilisant une variété de tactiques et de compétences non techniques et consacrant du temps et des efforts pour y parvenir. Ce document présente cinq histoires de changement au Cambodge, en Éthiopie, au Honduras, au Malawi et en Ouganda, sur la base d'entretiens avec un artisan du changement de chaque pays. Chaque histoire fournit un compte-rendu personnel de ce qui s'est passé, des défis rencontrés en cours de route, et des tactiques, des compétences non techniques et des ressources qui ont permis d'y parvenir.