Community of Practice: Water and Sanitation

This ongoing project seeks to develop decision-making tools to aid practitioners in Nepal to select the most appropriate water supply improvements (including water source selection, water collection, treatment, and storage), using selected small low-income communities as case studies. These include three rural communities (Bhalakhalak, Sonbarshi, Chamar Tolia) and a peri-urban squatter community near Kathmandu (Manohara). Household data was collected via questionnaires and site visits to assess the current practices and inform decision-making. Standard water quality data was also collected to characterise water sources, several of which were deemed unsuitable for safe water supply. A decision framework, in the form of a ‘Yes/No ’ decision tree, was then developed which incorporated site-specific technical, demographic, and socio-economic considerations and used literature information and local experience. It is hoped that the framework can be applied to decision-making in other low-income communities in Nepal that face similar challenges