WATER RESILIENCE
Strengthening understanding of how individuals, communities and places respond to water stress and how this impacts on the resilience of urban areas.
Cities across the globe are facing water crises. Rapidly rising populations, climate change and ageing infrastructures are combining to create long-term water scarcity alongside episodic shocks when public water supplies fail.
Around the world some 500m urban dwellers are currently estimated to live with water shortages, a figure that will rise to 1.9bn by 2050. This has far-reaching consequences for social and economic wellbeing and surrounding natural ecosystems.
In the face of mounting pressures, building resilience to water crises is recognised as one of the primary challenges facing human society today. In this section we draw on recent research to reflect on the actions taken by different actors to secure water supplies, what shapes these actions, the possible consequences of this and how this can affect resilience outcomes in both the short term and the longer term.
We focus on sub-Saharan Africa but include examples and lessons from other contexts. Follow these blogs if you are interested in water security and the complex interplay between resilience and urban development.
Urban Water Resilience: A rising theme but currently limited in its scope
Academic interest in the topic of water resilience has a short history but is rapidly increasing. Lucy Rodina provides an invaluable review of the literature, identifying how the literature is narrowly focused and omits some key perspectives. In this [...]
Water Stressed Cities: Individual choice, access to water and pathways to resilience in sub-Saharan Africa
Building resilience to water crises is one of the primary challenges facing cities today. The pressures are particularly acute in sub-Saharan Africa, where rapid rates of urbanization and economic growth - combined with the challenge of climate change and [...]
The rise of the off-grid city?
In the face of scarce or erratic public water supplies urban households are increasingly sourcing their own water supplies in sub-Saharan Africa. Typically, this is through commissioning their own borehole. Is this giving rise to the phenomena of the [...]
How much water and for whom (or what)?
Urban water resilience focuses on the ability of urban populations to manage a water shock and cope with water stress. Hidden within this statement are important questions as to how much water is needed to constitute coping and what [...]
Drilling dialogues: conversations about drilling professionalism and the rise of the off-grid city
Professionalism across the drilling industry is an over-looked factor in groundwater stewardship. It takes on an increasing significance as urban households across sub-Saharan Africa access groundwater reserves directly to self-provide their own water supplies. The African Water Association [...]