Intro

Throughout the course of the coming weeks, I will be exploring the immensely complex topic that is gender and the provision of safe water supplies and sanitation. 

I thought that, in this first blog post, I would attempt to convey my initial “brainstorming” ideas on the main challenges of addressing the relationship between gender and water supply. 

I have to confess that my initial response to the chosen blog title was to, almost automatically, assume that I would be focusing on the female gender specifically. This is intrinsically justified by reasons such as how, in developing countries, women are the ones often responsible for providing water for their household as well as being involved in the collection process. However, having thought about the topic a little deeper, I realised the need to not only focus our attention on women, but to actually understand the implications for both gender roles, and how these are influenced by economic, social, political and cultural realities. 

This blog will also attempt to address both sides of the relationship - i.e.: not only how inherent gender inequality leads to differences in the level of access to water, but also how the lack of safe water supplies and sanitation exacerbates differences between genders and the impact this has on Africa’s overall development. 

In the posts to come, I will start by looking at academic research to provide context on the extent of the issue, from the concept of “gender mainstreaming to UN’s ‘Water for Life’ initiative. Then, I shall research what is being done (and has been done in the past) in practice about the topic, and the difficulties with these policies; keeping up to date with any current news or debates in the meanwhile. Although, by the end, the blog might not have reached a definitive conclusion, I hope to have been able to share a light on the issue - which is more than often a contentious one in the socio-political realm - and provide some potential solutions.