This article highlights important challenges for drinking water safety monitoring: A single water quality test may miss periods of faecal contamination and overestimate how safe a water supply really is. Analysis of 524 small water supplies across Bangladesh, Nepal and Tanzania found that E. coli contamination is predominantly intermittent rather than consistent. Isolated cross-sectional surveys can underestimate contamination prevalence by factors of 1.4–5 times. Sampling during periods of highest risk, especially in wet weather, is more effective at identifying at-risk water supplies.
Moving towards risk-based operational monitoring that focuses on the timing of sampling and includes strategies to progressively identify different contamination pathways is recommended.
2026
Responsibilization in Water Supply in International Development
This paper explores responsibilization in the context of water supply in international development. Through a literature review, three questions are addressed: (1) How is responsibilization institutionalized and rationalized? (2) How is it operationalized and negotiated? (3) What are the impacts of responsibilization at the individual level?