Tired of seeing broken hand pumps and taps litter Africa, Asia, and Latin America, Ned Breslin sees these as signs of the critical need to assess water projects for their real impact. We’ve observed the same thing in Bangladesh (see our previous post here). As Breslin explains in the video below, the focus should not be on the quantity of water pumps installed.

He proposes devices that will be able to send information to investors when a water supply has broken down. However, this does not help to reduce the dependencies on external assistance. Another strategy, would be to implement the supporting local organisation structures or institutions at the community level that will ‘own’ the technology, and control its operation and maintenance. This is an argument for ‘water sovereignty’. We have explained this in our video documentary. You’ll find similar arguments for ‘food sovereignty’ explained in the video ‘A new future for small farmers‘ by Enkelaar, Smit and Reichert.