A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF IMPLEMENTING SMALL TOWNS WATER-SUPPLY

INTRODUCTION

The main aim of the study focuses on how water supply systems are implemented in small towns in rural communities in Ghana. Predominantly, examining the process of implementing Small Towns Water Supply Systems (STWSS) in Ghana, and also evaluate the results of the implementation process, why it has been implemented successfully in one town and not the other, by further identify and compare the factors that may have facilitated or impeded implementation. Two towns are studied (Jukwaa Krobo and Mfuom) both in the Twifo Heman Lower Denkyira  district in the Central Region of Ghana.

1.1 BACKGROUND

The government of Ghana, after independence in 1957, has pursued many different economic reform policies such as the Economic Reform Programme (ERP), Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP), and Public Sector Reforms (PSR) etc. to ensure rapid development across the country. Since water is life and a public good that government must provide, it is very important that improving this service must be core to governments’ agenda. In some parts of the world, citizens do not pay for this service like India and Norway.  Clean drinking water and domestic water supply are universally accepted as an important goal of development in India, hence it is generally perceived to be a free good (Thomas and Grindle 1990 p: 1169). Water is essential to life and no citizen must be denied of it, however, access to water is very important but its quality must be ensured by government. The water sector was not left out in the changing reforms being initiated by the government in an attempt to extend this service to all the other parts of the country and improve delivery of service. Though various agencies of government shared the responsibility of providing potable water to its citizens, in 1965 an Act was enacted, (Act 310) to formally give the Ghana Water and Sewage Corporation (GWSC) the sole responsibility to `provide and manage potable water supply and sewage services for domestic and industrial purposes throughout the country”, that is for both urban and rural Ghana (Republic of Ghana, SIP 2008-2015).

The water sector has seen several changes and challenges with the aim of increasing access to potable water especially to rural communities / small town’s whiles emphasizing on rural development. It is believed that, people living in rural areas are more than two thirds of Ghana’s population, and in the middle of the 1990’s it was estimated that only 35 % of these rural本站提供代写Essay，代写Assignment，请联系QQ：949925041 dwellers had access to quality water, the total population was about 17.5million at the time[http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/EXTABOUTUS/IDA/0,,contentMDK:21204612~menuPK:3266877~pagePK:51236175~piPK:437394~theSitePK:73154,00.html.
]. As a result, people were plagued mainly with diseases that are water related such as diarrhoea, skin diseases and intestinal and guinea worms infestation. Reported incidence increased, and was brought to government’s attention for action but later became its priority which necessitated a long term policy reform that could address the problem.