WATSAN Portal: Kibera - using simple data to improve formal water and sewerage coverage in slums Project Summary WATSAN Portal: Kibera is an innovative, online mapping and decision-making tool that enables community groups, nongovernmental organizations, and government agencies to rapidly and efficiently launch high-quality water and sanitation projects in the Kibera slum of Nairobi. The project has been been piloted in two villages in Kibera, covering a total of 100,000 residents, in a partnership led by Kounkuey Design Initiative, Spatial Collective and Nairobi City Water and Sewerage Company. The webtool can be accessed at Project Context Kibera is the largest informal settlement in Nairobi with population estimates ranging between 200,000 to 1,000,000. The majority of water is sold via overpriced and quasi-legal kiosks (only 4% percent have access to a water tap in their home 1 ). Unlined and unimproved pit latrines remain the primary sanitation facility; a mere 12% of the sanitation facilities have formal connections to the municipal sewerage lines that run through the settlement. As such, the majority of human waste passes directly into the Ngong River and its tributaries - one of the three major water systems in the Nairobi River Basin. In 2013, households reported that 25% of under-5s had suffered from diarrhea in the last two weeks 2. Diarrheal disease is one of the leading causes of death among children under 5 in slums 3. The current default approach to WATSAN provision in informal settlements is decentralized and informal. However, municipally-connected WATSAN projects are almost always cheaper than decentralized solutions, require less maintenance, and significantly reduce local pollution. The city s water service provider, Nairobi City Water and Sewerage Company (NCWSC), already pursues a strategy of network intensification to support connection of new and existing WATSAN projects to municipal water and sanitation infrastructure. Despite the good intentions of this strategy Small Service Providers (SSPs; comprising CBOs, NGOs and compound owners) often miss this opportunity as they have limited information on the location of municipal infrastructure or the process to connect. As a result, they are often forced to use environmentally and socially inefficient solutions, like building latrines that drain into watercourses or pit latrines that must be regularly emptied, at high cost.
WATSAN Portal: Kibera KDI has delivered multiple WATSAN projects in Kibera over the last seven years. Through these experiences, KDI became keenly aware of the large sums of time and resources wasted in navigating the opaque, formal-infrastructure-connection process, and recognized the need to make the process simpler. Project to date In 2012-2014 the Rockefeller Foundation supported KDI to develop a response to these challenges, called WATSAN Portal: Kibera. We invited the utility agency, Nairobi City Water and Sewerage Company (NCWSC) and technology social enterprise, Spatial Collective, to partner with us. The Portal is a web-based tool that makes geo-referenced maps of municipal infrastructure networks, available and searchable. Using the Portal, NGOs, CBOs, and residents (referred to collectively as Small Service Providers or "SSPs") can query potential WATSAN project locations in Kibera to quickly determine the physical and financial feasibility of connecting to NCWSC water and sewerage lines, and then access step-by-step directions for establishing a legal connection. When a municipal connection is not technically or financially feasible, the Portal provides information on viable, decentralized solutions. From November 2012 to date, a pilot of WATSAN Portal: Kibera has been developed and tested (to beta level) in 2 of Kibera s 13 villages to cover around a quarter of the settlement s total area. The development of the Portal s functions and user-experience was based on in-depth consultation with NCWSC, NGOs, CBOs, and community partners. In total over 51 individuals from 33 organizations were represented through 33 individual consultations and 9 formal, group workshops.
WATSAN Portal: Kibera The pilot website ( and watsanportal.co.ke) were launched and marketed for the pilot areas (Gatwekera and Laini Saba villages) in February 2014. Screenshot is shown above. Next Steps Based on the positive responses from the user engagement through the development of the tool, and the initial take-up and use of the website, there is significant evidence for the value and demand for this service. KDI proposes the following steps to develop the tool to the Kibera scale: 1. Quantify Impacts: test the pilot assumptions and quantification of impacts. 2. Build NCWSC Capacity: work with NCWSC to produce a needs assessment of training, preparation and institutional strengthening requirements to manage the Portal within the agency s ICT, Informal Settlements, and Engineering departments. 3. Expand the existing data sets to Kibera settlement: gather additional landmark and infrastructure data points and raise awareness amongst potential users in other villages. 4. Develop the Portal User Experience: enhance the website interface and design based on feedback from the pilot phase. 5. Adapt to Scale: use data from other informal settlements in Nairobi, Kenya and elsewhere to consider the possibility of the Portal s application in other locations. Outcomes and Impact The project will increase the ability of Small Service Providers, in partnership with the utility NCWSC, to deliver cost-effective and environmentally sound projects. The result will be an
increase in access to safe, clean, and fairly-priced water and sanitation facilities for current and future residents of Kibera. The associated developmental objectives include: a reduction in the incidence of diseases, mortality, and vulnerability associated with improved access to affordable, potable water and safe sanitation, across Kibera; and a reduction in environmental pollution of watercourses by latrines, with the resulting public health improvements in Kibera and downstream areas. Targeted Beneficiaries The project s direct beneficiaries will be the resident users of the water and sanitation facilities in Kibera, that are created by CBOs, NGOs, and government entities using the Portal. When the Portal is rolled out at the Kibera scale as proposed above, direct beneficiaries are estimated to be on the order of 30,000. NCWSC and SSPs will also benefit as they will be able to deliver their mandates more efficiently and cost-effectively. Any Kibera resident, who benefits from improved public health and environmental conditions associated with increased and improved water and sewerage connections facilitated via the Portal, is considered an indirect beneficiary. When the Portal is rolled out at the Kibera scale, these indirect beneficiaries are estimated to be on the order of 175,000. Downstream inhabitants will also benefit, though numbers are difficult to estimate. All of our target beneficiaries, present and future, are the extremely poor living in degraded urban environments. Over two-thirds of Kibera residents live on less than 1 USD per day3, have no formal trash collection, have poor access to safe water, are un or under-employed, and face serious health challenges. Civil society (NGOs, CBOs), private individuals and businesses (compound owners and sanitation block/water kiosk vendors) and the public sector (NCWSC) can all be seen as users of the Portal, who will positively impact beneficiaries, and whom will also benefit from increased efficiency and cost-effectiveness in delivering WATSAN projects. The need for such a simple, yet powerful tool exists in many informal settlements in Nairobi, in other Kenyan cities and indeed beyond, and we expect to demonstrate through our expansion, the flexibility of the tool to be used elsewhere. Impact Evaluation Strategy As the first step of a rigorous impact evaluation of the tool, KDI designed and implemented, in partnership with Anna Tompsett of University of Stockholm and Columbia University, a representative sample of 1,539 households on access to water and sanitation in the pilot areas and a follow-up survey in 119 sanitation facilities. Initial analysis of the data has demonstrated an alarming rate of reported diarrheal episodes amongst children, as well as significant incidences of robbery and insecurity at WATSAN facilities. Further data will be made available as analysis is completed over the coming months. In addition to the baseline survey, monitoring of the website by Spatial Collective has shown that 85 unique users have registered on the Portal so far. By monitoring the site and launching a follow-up survey in 2014 KDI will be able to quantify the impact of the tool on access to water and sanitation and related public health outcomes.
Since the fundamental consultations and technology have been developed the extension of the Portal to all of Kibera is a simple and cost-effective step to increase coverage and potential impact. The momentum gained from the development and the launch of the pilot can be capitalized on to quickly broaden the scope and take-up of the project. It is also important to ensure that the potentially highly useful information is available to the broadest demographic possible, to maximize impact and avoid an uneven development of projects. Press The following articles were posted related to the website s development and launch: 1. Business Daily Africa 2. Urban Gateway 3. Wired Magazine 4. KDI Press Release Project Partners Kounkuey Design Initiative (kounkuey.org) Spatial Collective (spatialcollective.com) Nairobi City Water and Sewerage Company (nairobiwater.co.ke) Contact Joe Mulligan, Associate Director, e: joe@kounkuey.org, t: +46 737 073 2109 Maserah House, Kenyatta Market, Nairobi, Kenya, t: +254 020 5223227 Kounkuey Design Initiative (KDI) KDI is a non-profit design and community development firm that partners with low-income communities in Africa, Latin America, and the United States to transform under-served neighborhoods into thriving communities. KDI has worked in Kibera since 2006 and has since partnered with multiple resident groups, CBOs, NGOs, and government institutions to deliver planning and community-driven infrastructure projects around the world. KDI has been recognized for our innovative approach to poverty alleviation by notable institutions such as The Rockefeller Foundation, The Swiss Re Foundation, The California Endowment, Ashoka Changemakers, American Express, Smithsonian Institute, and Echoing Green. Citations 1.Umande Trust. 2007. The Right to Water and Sanitation in Kibera, Nairobi, Kenya: An Action Research Report. Summary Version. Pg 5-6. 2. Kyobutungi, C. 2008, March 10. The burden of disease profile of residents of Nairobi s slums: Results from a Demographics Surveillance System, 6(1). Popular Health Metrics. Pg 5. 3.Binacchi, M. 2010. Slums and Shelter Policies in Kenya. The case of Kibera, Soweto East slum upgrading project, Saarbrucken, Germany: Lambert Academic Publishing. Pg 41.