Rural water supply

PES covers the period 9/80-3/84 and summarizes an assessment, based on visits to 22 villages in three areas and interviews with project-related personnel, undertaken in view of the project"s 7/84 completion date. To date, the project has built 296 of 300 planned dug wells and all 320 planned drilled wells, but only 157 pumps for these wells and only 100 of 550 planned demonstration latrines. More generally, moreover, the project has suffered from insufficient Mission management and support, weak technical management, an unqualified Chief of Party, poor procurement by the African American Purchasing Center, and misuse of expatriate specialists for skilled labor rather than for administration, planning and technology transfer. Further, neither dug nor drilled wells were deep enough to provide a permanent, adequate water supply and they were not properly developed and pump tested. The Moyno pumps provided inadequate volume and had mechanical failures; it is proposed to replace them with sturdy, low-cost, locally manufactured pumps. Also, failure to meet A.I.D. sanitary protection requirements for the areas around the wells makes contamination of the water source probable. Finally, although the project has trained 50 itinerant agents and 200 village health workers and will increase the number of organized village health committees from 80 to 170 by 11/84, training at all levels has been inadequate, and community participation - and probably also the project"s health and socioeconomic impact - have been too low. A negative external factor is the tendency of the new (8/84), non-elected Government of Burkina Faso (GOBF) to control all decisionmaking and to accept credit for the successes of this highly visible project while blaming USAID/BK for its failures. Nevertheless the project, which has recently acquired two very motivated technical directors, has good potential for benefitting the target population and will be extended to 11/30/85. Recommendations, inter alia, are to reorganize project management (including recruiting a direct-hire Project Officer) and focusing TA on training and community participation activities.