Our programme approach

Rainwater harvesting jars like the one pictured here in Uganda are one of the many sustainable technologies WaterAid promotes in its work.

Credit: WaterAid / Caroline Irby

As WaterAid's programmes have evolved so has its approach: from an initial emphasis on providing water supplies to poor communities through simple technologies, to the current approach of ensuring access is gained to safe water, sanitation and hygiene education through equitable, integrated and sustainable services working in partnership with various organisations.

Our work is informed by our guiding principles, which seek to ensure that solutions are:

• Appropriate - responding to the real needs of people living in poverty
• Inclusive - accessible, affordable and addressing the needs of the most marginalised people
• Local - working in partnership with local organisations and strengthening their capacity to deliver effective services responding to local needs
• Transferable - sharing learning from practical experience for replication and scaling-up
• Integrated - promoting good hygiene practices to ensure the best health and poverty outcomes for poor communities
• Sustainable - using simple, appropriate and easily-maintained technologies
• Accountable - working with service providers to ensure they are accountable and transparent to the communities they serve

The practice - policy interface

Our impact enables millions of people to take their first, essential steps out of poverty, but tackling a crisis of this scale is beyond the capability of WaterAid or any other single organisation. It is not WaterAid's role to provide universal access to water, sanitation and hygiene education services - that responsibility lies with governments.

The biggest challenge we face is a lack of political will which is why we work with our partner organisations and forge wider alliances to challenge the political environment. For instance, at the local level we work with our local government partners to scale up service delivery based on best practice and help direct it to where it is needed most.
 
At the national level decentralisation of power to the sub-national level often occurs without adequate resources or staff capacities. So we advocate that national governments accord higher priority and resources to the provision of water, sanitation and hygiene education, especially to the poorest sections of society.

At the international level we work with other organisations to influence the agenda of donors and to raise awareness of the general public in developed nations so they can exert pressure on their elected representatives.

Future directions

The future of WaterAid and our partner organisations is influenced of course by political, social, and economic trends and the effects they have on the water and sanitation sectors in the countries where we work.

There are three specific areas that we need to consider in respect of their implications on our programme approach:

• National and international discourse on accountability, transparency and governance
• International aid
• Climate change

Our main challenges are to deepen our understanding of our work and integrate it better, particularly in urban areas, sanitation services, water resources management and strengthening accountability and governance in the water and sanitation sector.

WaterAid is also moving from a 'needs-based' programme approach to one that is 'rights-based' - one that recognises the rights of the poor and excluded to basic services and addresses the immediate, intermediate and fundamental causes of exclusion. Read more about this and our approach to equity and inclusion here.

But our mission remains the same: to overcome poverty by enabling the world's poorest people to gain access to safe water, sanitation and hygiene education.