Abstract
Research has shown that inadequate access to water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) affects women and girls in several ways, including lowering their participation in the labour market and community activities and contributing to psychosocial stress and poor educational outcomes. There is growing awareness that addressing the gender inequalities related to WASH that many women and girls face on a daily basis must go beyond focusing on delivery of infrastructure and facilities alone and include attention to issues of empowerment. Yet there is limited exploration of how the concept of empowerment is defined and applied in the WASH sector and thus limited information on how it could be measured. This study used concept mapping to uncover the meaning and key dimensions of empowerment in WASH among 34 and 24 stakeholders in Asutifi North District, Ghana, and Banfora Commune, Burkina Faso, respectively. The study was part of initial steps toward choosing indicators for developing an Empowerment in WASH Index. In Ghana and Burkina Faso, 42 and 29 items were generated, respectively. These items were thought to empower men and women in WASH at the household and community levels. In both case studies, 7 clusters were generated and named by participants, and themes related to sharing of information, sociocultural norms, participation, and accessibility of WASH services were associated with empowerment. Some themes were unique to each case study site. Participants also showed a multidimensional and multilevel understanding of empowerment. Concept mapping created an effective balance between individual and group contributions and facilitated accessible, rapid, and contextually relevant data collection. The findings can be used to generate domains of empowerment in future quantitative research as well as inform the design of the Empowerment in WASH Index.
Highlights
Access to safe water and improved sanitation and hygiene (WASH) is fundamental for health and for reducing inequalities, 844 million people still lacked access to basic drinking water services and 2.3 billion people did not have access to basic sanitation services in 2015 globally (WHO/UNICEF, 2017)
Graham, Hirai, and Kim (2016) report that among households that spend more than 30 min on water collection in 24 sub-Saharan African countries, adult women were primarily responsible for water collection in all the countries
Substantial research has focused on the importance of women’s empowerment for poverty reduction and development but overlooked how it occurs in the WASH sector
Summary
Access to safe water and improved sanitation and hygiene (WASH) is fundamental for health and for reducing inequalities, 844 million people still lacked access to basic drinking water services and 2.3 billion people did not have access to basic sanitation services in 2015 globally (WHO/UNICEF, 2017). Aside from the opportunity cost of time spent on water collection, women expend significant amounts of calories and risk contracting water-related diseases. Despite the importance of gender outcomes for WASH interventions, focus continues to be placed on measuring progress through improve ments in WASH infrastructure, such as access to improved water sources and sanitation facilities (Lahiri-Dutt, 2015). Interventions to provide these facilities are expected to result in improved outcomes for women and girls, such as more time for productive activities and education, but
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