IMPROVING ACCESS TO DRINKING WATER AND SANITATION IN MALAWI
Malawi ranks as one of the poorest countries in the world. Access to safe drinking water and sanitation is, if available, often intermittent and unreliable. In Mzimba Town in Malawi’s Northern Region, the water system was able to provide only 12 hours of service per day, and covered only 65% of its roughly 48,000 inhabit- ants. Among the water system’s issues were insufficient capacity of the water treatment plant, inadequate and cor- roded pipes, and limited water storage capacity. Apart from the local hospi- tal’s own wastewater treatment ponds, Mzimba Town had no sewerage system, with households and other establish- ment using on-site disposal systems such as pit latrines and septic tanks. To support the government in rehabilitating and expand- ing Mzimba Town’s water and sanitation system, in 2015 the OPEC Fund approved a US$14.8 million loan, which was disbursed between 2016 and 2020. The project was
co-financed by the African Development Bank. The pro- ject expanded the water treatment plant’s capacity from 1,500m3/day to 12,000m3/day, upgraded the diameter of the main water transmission line from 250 millimeters
to 500 millimeters over a length of 40.1 kilometers, increased the length of the distribution system from 22 kilometers to 105.8 kilometers and constructed 13 sanitation facilities. The project also un- dertook reforestation activities, planting 670,000 seedlings.
As a result of the project, by the time of project evaluation the share of the popu-
lation with access to potable water supply improved from 65 percent to 92 percent, and the average time of daily piped water availability increased from 12 hours per day to 22 hours per day. The incidence of water borne diseas- es (e.g. diarrhea) decreased from 35 percent to 3 percent, and the share of the population with access to improved sanitation rose from 45 percent to 97 percent.
The share of the population with access to improved sanitation rose from 45% to
97%
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