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Are the Water Trips in the Dryland Kenya for Sustainable Development, Journeys in Vain or Trips to Oblivion?


AO Afullo
BO Danga

Abstract

Kenya’s households’ (HH) water access status is appalling. As a gender based task, women and children make billions of trips to satisfy HH water needs, taking a heavy toll on societal growth and development. Kenya’s 4872 randomly sampled HHs from six Arid and semi-Arid land (ASALs) counties were studied using interviews and focused group discussions. The aim was to determine the burden of water fetching in Kenya-ASALs. On a daily basis, HHs make 3.06 water trips of 49.42+0.36 minutes, largely shouldered by females (2.69 trips); males (0.22); women (2.51); men (0.12) and children (0.43 trips). The 2.5 million Kenyan-ASAL households make 7,658,500 trips daily (2,795,352,500 annually). Of these, children make 395,477,500; women (2,287,637,500); and men (112,237,500 trips). With this kind of burden, the children and women are denied opportunity for self-development. Water supply mainstreaming is an urgent priority in Kenya-ASALs.

Key words: Water Supply, Sustainability, Gender, Development, Kenya ASALS

 


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eISSN: 1998-0507