1

Experimenting with practical Transition Groundwater

management strategies for the Urban Poor in Sub-

Saharan Africa

(T-GroUP)

Jan Willem Foppen

Contents

Background:

– groundwater and the urban poor

– slums as complex adaptive systems

Key questions

Activities overview

Planning and project set-up

2

Groundwater and the urban poor

Inadequate (public) water services in slums in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)

Urban poor rely in part or in full on groundwater (Grönwall et al., 2010)

3

Groundwater and the urban poor

From 2010 to 2050: urban population from 300 million to > 1 billion. Mostly slums.

Mixed groundwater use will remain, but:

• good / safe quality groundwater is scarce;

• no institutions managing urban groundwater reserves;

• (un)sustainable (?).

How to move away from not managed unsustainable practices towards sustainable

urban groundwater management, which takes the interests of slum dwellers into

consideration??

4

Slums as complex adaptive systems (CAS)

Characteristics of complex adaptive systems:

Complex: Many interacting ‘dimensions’ : social, political, legal, economical,

religious, environmental, infrastructural, etc.

Self-organizing: Emerge from elements making up the system

Adaptive: Ability to change their behavior and adapt to new relationships

Dynamic: Can undergo rapid and unpredictable transformations

Co-evolving: Change and are changed by their environment

5

Transition management

A social learning protocol aimed at making controlled and intentional changes in

a societal CAS in order to create or spark a system change;

6

Not new. See: www.transitionsnetwork.org

Elsevier journal:

Recognized during SWITCH (www.switchurbanwater.eu); insufficient time to

‘play’ with it

Transition management

•Existing practical toolbox of participatory techniques;

•Easy to include water governance issues;

But:

•Never applied to urban groundwater governance;

•Never applied to SSA;

•Framework of power relations is poorly developed;

•Can TM become a model for urban groundwater governance?

7

Key question(s)

Changes required to make transition towards sustainable groundwater

management in urban SSA?

RQ1: Relations between 'below-ground' and 'above-ground' systems?

RQ2: Can TM be a suitable model for groundwater management and

governance in urban SSA?

8

3 slum areas or ‘urban laboratories’:

1. Bwaise slum (Kampala, Ug)

2. Sombetini slum (Arusha, Tan)

3. Dodowa (Accra, Gh)

RQ1: Extended Systems Analysis - activities

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Hydrogeology: drilling, aquifer characterization, network design, piezometer

installation, automated monitoring (e.g.arduinos)

Groundwater quality: chemistry and viral pathogens, perhaps pharmaceuticals

Water governance, legal issues, power dynamics: (qualitative) literature surveys, field

observations, interviews with officials and users, focus group discussions, and multi-

level institutional analyses and mapping

Economics: (qualitative and quantitative) surveys among users and producers of

groundwater, formal or informal operators (households, informal and formal private

water vendors, state-owned enterprises or utilities).

Integration of above and below ground systems

Developments in 20-50 years time

ALLUVIAL SAND AQUIFER (Confined by top soils and a stiff clay layer at the bottom)

STIFF CLAY CONFINING LAYER

NO3-rich groundwater

REGOLITH AQUIFER

Spring High NO3 > 2mM

Low pH < 5

SLUM AREA

Pit latrine leachate NH4 = 3.2 mM

P O4 = 26 M

Nitrate reducing

zone

Mn- reducing

zone

Strongly Fe - reducing zone PO4 regulated by adsorption to calcite NO3 removed by denitrification NH4 partially removed by Anammox

Fe2+, NH4, PO4 < 10 M

Mn2+, NO3 NO3

Nsooba Channel NH4 = 0.5 – 3 mM

PO4 = 3.6 – 25 M NO3 = 0 – 0.26 mM

Fractured/ weathered regolith

N2

Shallow groundwater flow and hydrochemistry

in Bwaise slum

(Nyenje et al., 2013; -, 2014; -, 2014a; -, 2015)

Selected viruses (gc/ml) Bwaise slum

N

KATOOGO

BU

GA

LA

NI BO

KA

SA

KA

LIM

ALI

ST

. F

RA

NC

IS

KAWAALA ROAD

BO

MB

O/G

ULU

RO

AD

NABWERU ROAD

C

Kampala

B W A I S E III

N A

B

W

E

R

U

Drain

100 0 Metres300200100

N

SCALE 1 : 2,500

Drain

D

Nsoba drainage channel

Nakam

ilo

D

GG

G

G

Pt

G

GG

7.62x10

1.537.47

Adenoviruses-F and G

Rotavirus

D: Drinking water spring

Grey waterG:Pt: Pit latrine

Main drainage Channels

12.5

1.371.19

KEY

26.5

2.13

2.5

2.24

3.15

0.27

1.66

1.87x10

7.36x102.78

3.32x10

1.45

4.05

00

0

0

0

0

0

00

0

0

0

0

0

P1NS1

P4

A1

P9

00

A2A3NS2

P2

P8D3

A4

P12

P10

P11

P7

P6

D1 P5

NS3

P3

D2

C1

NS4

Nsoba drainage channel

Discharge monitoringlocation

Sampling locationsA, B, D, NS, P:

-3

1

2

2.481

5.52x103x10

12.66x10-1

2.09x10-1

3.27x10-1

4.87x10-2

5.12 -1

7.02x10-1

-16.87x10

-17.4x10

-13.51x10

2.96x10-1

(Katukiza et al., 2013 b)

Outcomes of RQ1

New science:

1. Urban groundwater dynamics.

2. Depth specific pollution patterns.

3. Dynamics of pathogens and indicators.

4. Current groundwater governance practices.

5. Water related power dynamics.

6. Slum water economics.

7. Analysis of relations and effects.

8. Comparison between Ghana, Uganda, and Tanzania.

9. Future prediction (20-50 years from now).

Open-access peer reviewed articles, course materials, policy briefs, and

presentations at conferences through regional networks like Waternet,

ASKNet, and AGW-Net, etc..

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RQ2: TM - activities

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Action-oriented research: carry out the social learning protocol

TM cycle in an S-curve

Q: Who is doing this? A: The Learning Alliance.

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Characteristics of the Learning Alliance

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•10-15 people;

•Multi-sectoral, multi-level urban frontrunners;

•Carry out the TM wheel or protocol;

•Will use information from RQ1;

•Learn from each other’s knowledge and perspectives (social learning);

•Integration of ideas into set of transition experiments;

•Carry out transition experiments and learn from them;

•Systemic thinking.

RQ2: Important outcomes

New science:

1. How to compose an effective Learning Alliance?

2. Social learning processes in the Learning Alliances (related to e.g. long

term vision, transition narrative, transition agenda, etc.).

3. Key transition experiments.

4. Results of the TM process in Urban Laboratories.

5. Comparison of the TM process between ULs.

6. Critical review of the applicability of TM in groundwater related problems

in slums in SSA.

7. Can TM be a new groundwater governance model?

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RQ2: Important outcomes

Practical methodology manuals on:

1) Systems analysis,

2) Actor analysis,

3) Visioning,

4) Transition narrative,

5) Transition agenda,

6) From vision to action: carrying out transition experiments,

7) Monitoring transition experiments.

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Planning and project set-up

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Planning:

RQ1: Yr 1, yr 2, yr 3 (part of)

RQ2: Yr 2 (part of), yr 3, yr 4

LTTs:

Dodowa: Lutterodt, Oduro-Kwarteng, Saka

Arusha: Komakech, Machunda, Nelson

Kampala: Nyenje, Isoke, Twinomucunguzi, Kulabako, Kansiime

Expert Teams:

Hydrogeology: Lutterodt, Nyenje, Kulabako, Kansiime, Foppen

Pathogen (transport): Lutterodt, Van de Vossenberg, Foppen

Governance: Kooy, Grönwall, Komakech

Economics: Oduro-Kwarteng, Isoke, Van Dijk

Transitioning: Nastar, Olsson

Project partners: 5 (Dodowa), 5 (Arusha), 6 (Kampala)

Sub-contractors: Van Dijk, LTT support, drilling companies