Water - and more - for the barrios of Tegucigalpa

Metell, Karin and Mooijman, Anna Maria (1998)
In: Waterlines, vol. 17, no. 1, p. 19-21, 32

In Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras, 400,000 people live in "barrios marginales", and these increasing peri-urban settlements are leaving basic social services lagging severely behind. In the early 1980s, most of the peri-urban communities in Tegucigalpa lacked access to a drinking water source - a family could spend as much as a third of its income on water from a vendor. To alleviate this pressing problem, UNICEF and the National Water Board, SANAA, began a programme in 1987 for peri-urban communities. The resulting safe, potable water comes from boreholes and surface water, treated by SANAA. Treated water is distributed through the conventional network, and by water trucks to public standposts or in-house connections.

Under the terms of the UNICEF/SANAA programme, a community becomes eligible for a water project by setting up an independent water committee to run and manage its own water system from the construction process onward. Eventually the community becomes the owner of the water system and is responsible for collecting fees, administration, and operation and maintenance. Women, the driving force behind the organization of communities, fill approximately one third of the positions on water boards, 62% as committee president or financial controller, and as well, make up half of the participants in plumbing workshops. The construction of water systems has progressed more quickly than expected and by the year 2000, all Tegucigalpa's legalized peri-urban communities should have their own water system installed and functioning.

The next step is the introduction of a hygiene education programme to combat the major health problem of diarrhoea and other water-related diseases. Family visitors, mostly women, are recruited from the community and trained in hygiene education and sanitation. In about 80% of the houses visited, there has been a significant change in sanitation and hygiene behaviour. The Honduran Government's Executive Unit for Settlement in Development is also supporting teachers and local schools in a personal and domestic hygiene education initiative.

At present, more than 150,000 people living in 95% of Tegucigalpa's barrios have already benefited from the water supply programme. Much of the programme's success must be attributed to women willing to organize themselves and work for the benefit of their families and neighbours. Gaining access to clean water is the first step in obtaining other services and in improving the community. A new problem, the increase in wastewater as a result of the water supply, is now being tackled by women community members who are willing and able to pay for sanitation.