The spotted zebra: Cohabitation between informal solutions and public-owned infrastructures for water supply in the Rio de Janeiro Metropolitan Region

Antonella Maiello,Ana Lucia Nogueira De Paiva Britto,Suyá Quintslr

doi:10.2166/wp.2020.115

Abstract

Abstract In many emerging and developing countries hybrid systems, not completely public nor private, have become a regrettable unstandardized ‘standard’ for water and sanitation service (WSS) provisions. These spotted zebras deserve the attention of both the scientific community and policymakers being ambiguous solutions. On the one hand, the hybrid systems allow broadening the access to the water supply service in face of the challenge to manage, maintain and adapt large infrastructures in a time of increasing climate change impacts, water-supply demand and drinking water scarcity. On the other hand, by embodying informal artefacts and unregulated behaviours to use natural resources, the hybrid systems enhance the vulnerability and precariousness of the population that is normally not reached by the formal public infrastructure. The paper presents findings of research conducted in Queimados, in the Rio de Janeiro Metropolitan Area. Our study suggests that grassroots solutions, albeit being an opportunity when integrated, represent a threat when standing alone, and it is critical to further discuss ways to promote such integration within a structured institutional public framework. Conclusions stress the need to rethink the grassroots engagement within socio-technical transition emphasizing the nexus between political culture, civic education and infrastructural solutions.

Highlights

Three main models of water service provision have prevailed in the last century: public, market-based and community-based
We explored a hybrid system for water supply in the Rio de Janeiro Metropolitan Region
The genetically mutated animal becomes more vulnerable to the environment than the others. This outlier appearance and peculiar vulnerability symbolize effectively the water supply system we explored in the Rio de Janeiro Metropolitan Region (RJMR)

Summary

Introduction

Three main models of water service provision have prevailed in the last century: public, market-based and community-based. The so-called qanat, kanat or karez in Asia, and khettara or foggara in northern Africa are typical examples They represent a sustainable and ancient grassroots-based system that has been currently abandoned, not for technical but for social and economic reasons (Wessels, 2008). These examples show that the implementation of technical solutions is determined by social and political factors. STS are technical devices, socially produced, and geared to meet specific human community needs We relied on this theoretical perspective for this research, part of the DESAFIO project, a UE 7th Framework Program about the democratization of WSS in Latin America. Here we use this term with specific reference to the water supply

Methods

Results

Conclusion