Women and Water Resources: Continued Marginalisation and New Policies

Cleaver, Frances and Elson, Diane (1995) Women and Water Resources: Continued
The Gatekeeper Series of International Institute for Environment and Development's Sustainable Agriculture Programme, no. 49, p. 3-16

The policy context for water resources has shifted over the last decade so that the state ceases to be a provider of water resources, and instead creates an enabling environment for others to provide and use water resources. The emphasis now is on creating a "sector" for water-related activities by the establishment of a framework by governments and external donor agencies in which communities can themselves construct, operate and manage improved facilities. This paper considers the extent to which the new approach to water is gender aware and outlines steps that might be taken to increase the level of gender awareness.

Some of these new policies are in danger of marginalising women as managers of water resources. The move toward viewing water primarily as an economic resource shifts the emphasis away from the area of health in which women have recognized interests and a strong professional presence. Furthermore, underplaying the potential health benefits of improved water and sanitation, undermines the recognized role of women as informal hygiene educators at the household level. As well, the shift away from health hits a sector in which women are in positions which enable them to implement gender aware policies. The new system of water resource management revolving around cash and committees appears to be gender neutral but in reality is marked by gender bias of various forms especially since women have less access to cash than men. The centrepiece of the new approach is willingness to pay but women's willingness to pay may not be matched by their ability to pay and they may be unable to raise the cash from their husbands who regard water as women's responsibility and place a lower value on saving women's time and effort than the women do themselves. Women are caught in a vicious circle - without improved water supplies they have no spare time for income generating activities, but without the income they cannot pay for new facilities. Due to the commoditisation of water, gender differences may result in under investment in water resources for domestic use where women predominate as the focus shifts to supplying "productive" water where men predominate and where the economic benefits are more obvious. The desirability of "ownership" is current in recent statements about water, but it is optimistic to assume that vesting ownership of a water source in the community will give women equal rights over that resource. Although the implementation of community management seems to provide opportunities for women on water committees, they are unlikely to exercise real power in spheres effectively dominated by men in the majority of situations. Even when women are given more responsibility within the management system, it is not often matched by more rights. This is much more likely to happen if women are organized in some kind of movement for social action which will give them a presence in the public arena. Community management is seen as a universal panacea for problems in the sector, but in practice, the water using community is likely to be predominated by women, whereas the decision making community is far more likely to be dominated by men.

The marginalisation of women in water resource management is cause for concern on grounds of equity as well as efficiency since women have knowledge of water resources and their effective use. Developing a gender aware system of management means rethinking the instruments and processes currently being developed. Appropriate means of gaining further understanding of gender roles in water resource management could be incorporated into project planning, monitoring and evaluation through analysis at the waterpoint, household and institutional level. The paper concludes that the marginalisation of women can largely be avoided by recognizing that all data should be disaggregated by gender, that the situation of women and men in relation to markets and meetings differs, that matching ability to pay and willingness to pay may require redistribution of income to women, that water but also women's time is an economic good and that markets are likely to undervalue women's time, and that gender barriers to effective and equitable management of water resources are more likely to be overcome if women are organized into movements for change.