SIASAR: a country-led indicator framework for monitoring the rural water and sanitation sector in Latin America and the Caribbean

Abstract

The provision of water supply, sanitation and hygiene services has emerged as a top priority in the development agenda in Latin American and the Caribbean. In light of the investments envisaged to reach the targets set by the sustainable development goals, information systems will play a key role in improving decision-making. In this context, this article introduces a country-led and global IS, which has been increasingly implemented in numerous countries across Latin America and the Caribbean as a policy instrument to support national and local decision-making: the Rural Water and Sanitation Information System (SIASAR). SIASAR includes a comprehensive framework for data collection, analysis and dissemination that simultaneously fulfils different stakeholder needs. This article analyses these three key monitoring issues from the viewpoint of stakeholder involvement. Our results indicate that SIASAR represents a suitable monitoring framework to analyse sustainable services and the level of service delivered. Additionally, we highlighted some of the advantages of adopting a continued participatory approach in system development, including: (i) the stimulation of experience exchange and knowledge sharing between recipient countries; (ii) the promotion of learning-by-doing; and (iii) an increase of regional understanding, collaboration and comparisons.