How did rural areas in southern Colombia manage water during the pandemic?

Community water providers in rural areas faced many challenges at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new scientific paper published and led by a group of researchers from the Universidad del Valle (Univalle).

Today, access to safe drinking water varies greatly in Colombia, according to a report by the Colombian government in 2019: One fifth of the municipalities have public water service coverage of more than 90%, but some 6% of the country's municipalities have coverage of less than 15%. 

A key part of drinking water management are the Community Water and Sanitation Management Organizations (CWMSOs). A key part of drinking water management are the Community Water and Sanitation Management Organizations (OCGAS in Spanish), represented by second-tier associations such as AQUACOL and FECOSER.

In the paper, "Retos y Oportunidades de la Gestión Comunitaria del Agua en la ruralidad de la Cuenca Alta del río Cauca, Colombia, bajo la pandemia del COVID-19" which will be published in July 2022 in the scientific journal Prospectiva, the researchers showed that OCGAS faced major challenges including the lack of payments and the influx of new residents.

"One difficulty arising during the pandemic was the increase in subscription requests to access water when people from the city came to rural areas during the pandemic," Carolina Blanco-Moreno said, who is a doctoral researcher attached to the CINARA institute. She added that the work also served to generate data and evidence to improve draft legislation and other public policy related to the rural water and sanitation sector. 

Foto: Investigadores con trabajadores de OCGA ACUAPIHAMABRIS, Corregimiento La Habana, municipio de Buga. Crédito: Daniela Ruiz-Grisales

Structural Challenges and Pandemic Problems

Blanco-Moreno explained that many of the challenges were present before and increased during the pandemic, for example, collection due to lack of payment by the population, limitation of collective activities due to mobility restrictions established by the national government, and increased demand for water due to the migration of population from cities to rural areas.

"Information was disseminated that people did not need to pay for their water services during the pandemic due to subsidies decreed by the government, but this only applied to urban providers, in rural areas it did not apply.... still, people did not pay because of this misunderstanding, which caused problems for OCGAS," Blanco-Moreno said.

The researchers found that there was a higher percentage of organizations with more than 500 subscribers that identified problems, which may be due to the level of concentration of their population, favorable for the presence and spread of the virus.

"It is necessary to better understand the reality of community water management organizations in order to strengthen them, as they are fundamental to guaranteeing the human right to water in many rural areas of the country, as well as in peri-urban and even urban areas," explained Daniela Ruiz-Grisales, a project collaborator and member of FECOSER, a second-tier organization.

"One of the main challenges was related to the virtual methodology that was chosen because of the pandemic context, since in many areas there is no internet coverage, and in some areas there is no cellular signal coverage either," Ruiz said.

Ruiz's role in the project was to support the construction of databases, design and application of the survey for community organizations, research on the actions of second level organizations, analysis of regulations, analysis of problems, and construction of public policy guidelines. Jorge Luis Amaya, who belongs to AQUACOL, played the same role as Ruiz in the project.

Ruiz said that the main impact of the arrival of people from the city to the small towns on the community aqueducts or community water management organizations was the increase in demand, difficulties in the operational processes since it was necessary to increase the frequency of procedures such as disinfection.

"In addition, some people bring very different visions of the territory, placing emotional burdens, stress, complaints that do not recognize the context, on the administrative boards and on those in charge of managing the systems", commented Ruiz.

 

Read more from the  CINARA Institute: Univalle Researchers Plumb The Depths of Daily Water Use 

Community Benefits

Para la Blanco-Moreno, hay un gran rol para universidades públicas como Univalle para hacer investigación que puede beneficiar las comunidades del suroccidente de Colombia.

or Blanco-Moreno, there is a great role for public universities like Univalle to do research that can benefit the communities of southwestern Colombia.

"Research always has an intentionality and in this case it is at the service of the communities and I believe that this is the role of the academic, to recognize at whose service it is and to provide the inputs for the communities to have information about themselves and their processes," explained Professor Blanco-Moreno adding that the hope is that these organizations can have a more active role in front of the institutions that develop public policy in the country.

Professor Mario Alejandro Pérez Rincón, who is also at CINARA, works on the topic of community management and is Blanco's supervisor said that the goal was to improve and enhance community management of water for human consumption; and contribute to strengthening community water networks and organizations for greater visibility in societies and greater recognition by the state.

"Recognition is a strategy of political struggle and seeks to make visible what they want to hide and the results of this work are academic-political,"  Professor Perez said. 

Professor Perez stated that a high percentage of rural aqueduct systems in Colombia are managed by community organizations and require a lot of support, but they supply some 10 million people in Colombia.

"The opportunities are to help the community organizations that are studied, and that can be extrapolated as a political-academic alternative to the struggles of community management against privatizing models in rural areas," Professor Perez explained , adding that the challenges are to properly interpret the data and results found to enhance the work of community organizations and do something with a good academic and research significance. 

Photo: the XIV Regional Meeting of Community Aqueducts of Valle del Cauca, in 2020, with community water managers from OCGAS linked to FECOSER. Credit: Daniela Ruiz-Grisales

If you would like to contact the researchers or learn more about the projects, please write to the Communications Office, Faculty of Engineering: comunicaingenieria(at)correounivalle.edu.co.

Banner photo: Carolina Blanco-Moreno, a doctoral researcher at the CINARA institute: Andrew James/NCC-FI/Univalle

Foto de la portada: Carolina Blanco-Moreno Credito: Andrew James/NCC-FI/Umivalle