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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:The Impact of Participation on Sustainability: An Analysis of the Malawi Rural Piped Scheme Program
Author:Kleemeier, ElizabethISNI
Year:2000
Periodical:World Development
Volume:28
Issue:5
Pages:929-944
Language:English
Geographic term:Malawi
Subjects:popular participation
water supply
Agriculture, Natural Resources and the Environment
Development and Technology
External link:https://doi.org/10.1016/S0305-750X(99)00155-2
Abstract:For several decades, donors and governments have used participatory strategies in all kinds of poverty alleviation programmes, in the belief that participation is the most effective means both to deliver and sustain benefits to the poor. This paper explores the assumed link between participation and sustainability by presenting findings from a study of the operation and maintenance of rural water supplies that were constructed under a programme widely praised for its exemplary approach to community participation, viz. the Malawi Rural Piped Scheme Programme. Activities for this programme began in 1968. Today, the smallest schemes, and the newest one, are performing well, but about half the schemes are performing poorly, and a third of these are functioning abysmally. Two implementation decisions would have improved performance, namely cash contributions from consumers, and the construction of smaller schemes. The participatory approach sets up community organizations capable of managing small rural piped gravity schemes, but it does not address the need of larger schemes for support from a competent external agency. Bibliogr., note, sum.
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