Strong water committees equals strong WASH communities in Fiji and Solomon Islands

A rural Fijian checks his village's water supply (International WaterCentre / Diana Gonzalez) 

It’s a thumbs up for this dam in rural Fiji, where community-based water management is being strengthened through a socially inclusive and capacity building approach as part of the country's Drinking Water Safety and Security Planning (DWSSP).

Community-based water management is the dominant water service model in Fiji, and all rural communities are required by the government to have a water committee – members of the community, who take leadership on community water resource and water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) management to ensure everyone has access to safe, reliable and sustainable supplies.

With support from Australia through Water for Women’s Pacific Community Water Management Plus project (PaCWaM+), the International WaterCentre (IWC) partnered with the University of the South Pacific (USP) and Solomon Islands National University (SINU) to develop the Strong Water Committees – Strong WASH Communities Implementation Guide for community workshops in rural Fiji.

This guide complements existing guidance provided by governments and CSOs to water committees that focuses on roles and responsibilities and strengthening the technical capacity of committees.

Strong Water Committees – Strong WASH Communities workshops are designed to encourage the water committees to reflect on how they can make their committee stronger and work better with the whole community. Activities also help to build committees’ awareness and understanding of how water moves through the environment and becomes contaminated, so that communities are better placed to identify hazards by themselves and manage problems as they arise.

Though surface water is used as the main source of supply for major towns on the larger, high islands of Fiji. Some small, low lying islands rely exclusively on groundwater and may also harness rainwater. Groundwater occurs on both the large islands and small low-lying islands, but the groundwater issues and challenges in these different physical environments differ.¹ 

What we do on the surface matters underground - in many places, human activities over-use and contaminate groundwater. Safely managed water and sanitation services plays an important role in protecting groundwater.

“Everyone in the community has a role to play, but it is also important there is a group of people taking on leadership of the management of the water system so that it continues to function as designed and everyone has access to safe and plentiful water.” 

Strong Water Committees – Strong WASH Communities Implementation Guide

The workshop activities were developed following research by IWC, USP and SINU, in Fiji and Solomon Islands, which indicated that sustaining committee membership and action is a significant challenge that can be supported by enabling actors, such as governments, CSOs and utilities, which can provide encouragement and support to committees to become stronger.

Part of making water committees stronger is ensuring diverse representation. When it comes to making the invisible visible in communities, it is only through gender and social inclusion that we can ensure WASH services and systems are accessible and effective for everyone, more climate-resilient and sustainable. This is central to achieving the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals.

That is why Water for Women is changing mindsets in a changing climate - WASH delivery offers an important entry point to facilitate positive changes in social norms, attitudes and gender relations to ensure that women and other marginalised groups are given a voice in water resource and WASH planning.

This implementation guide provides a “how to” for water supply or WASH field officers from civil society organisations (CSOs), governments, utilities, or any other organisations supporting rural community water management, to undertake the Strong Water Committees – Strong WASH Communities community workshops. It can also be used by WASH programmers when designing water supply or WASH community projects.

View the Fiji Guide

View the Solomon Islands Guide

¹. pacificwater.org