Honduras
Presentation by Stef Smits and Andrès Gil of IRC on background, context, technology costs, water resources, institutional arrangements and tariffs for MUS in Honduras.
In this video a woman explains how she, throughout the implementation of the MUS project in her community, is able to support her family. This video is made by Andrés Gil (participant of the IRC Southern Youth Zone Programme) who is currently carrying out an assessment on the implementation of MUS in the department of La Paz in Honduras. The video is in Spanish.
The video is part of a blogpost that can be found by following this link.
This guide, developed in partnership between IRC and RAS-HON (Water and Sanitation Network of Honduras), presents guidelines for the planning, design and implementation of MUS systems in Honduras. It has been developed and tested in the context of a pilot MUS programme, consisting of 6 MUS systems in the Department of La Paz. Lessons from these pilot systems have been taken up in these guidelines. The guides consist of a conceptual introduction to MUS in the context of Honduras, a series of steps in planning MUS systems and tools that may help in this process.
This case study captures de facto MUS practices in 14 communities in Honduras. Specifically, it looks into the question of how such practices contribute to people's livelihoods and how they contribute to sustainability of the rural water supply services. It concludes that MUS is a common practice in nearly all households and in nearly all communities. The relative importance of MUS, however, depends on the livelihood strategy of a household. The study also shows how MUS can be regulated in such a way that it doesn't negatively affect system sustainability.
Tupac Mejia's presentation dealt with guidelines for MUS design and their application in Honduras.
This presentation looks into the de facto use of rural piped water supply for productive purposes in Honduras. It looks amongst others at the benefits derived from this as well as the implications for sustainability of services.
Stef Smits, Túpac Mejía, Senia Eben Rodríguez and Damián Suazo: Effects of multiple use of water on the sustainability of rural water supply services in Honduras
The de facto use of rural water supply systems for productive purposes is a practice that has recently received recognition in Honduras. This paper presents the results of a study that tried to further characterise this existing practice in a more structured way through 14 case studies, in particular analyzing its effects on people’s livelihoods as well as on sustainability in service provision. The cases show the nearly universal existence of productive use of rural water supplies, but showed that the extent of the uses and the relative importance in people’s livelihoods differs a lot between different user categories. Although this de facto use of rural water supply systems may bring risks for sustainability in service provision, the cases also showed that a number of relatively simple measures can help in regulating water use. The authors believe that multiple use of water can be accommodated into service provision in such a way that it doesn’t cause negative impacts. [authors abstract]
Powerpoint presentation by Stef Smits, IRC, given at the Thematic Group Meeting in London, 2007.