By Zerihun Desta, Chief Operating Officer and Adrienne Lane, Vice President of Partnerships at Water for Good
Welcome to the second blog in our special series of Deep Dives, where we take an in-depth look at the unique strategies, evidence, and challenges we face in our programs and operations. Today, we focus on our diversity of operation and maintenance models that keep safe water flowing for good.
We’d love to know your feedback and will aim to answer questions. Join the conversation in the LinkedIn comments or reach out to us directly at info@waterforgood.org.
Solutions for Rural Water Service Reliability and Sustainability
Rural water services are often unreliable due to weak systems: there is widespread lack of preventative maintenance, infrastructure prematurely fails, and communities and local governments often can’t access spare parts nor prompt, effective, and affordable repair services. Approximately 15% of hand pump projects fail within their first year of construction, and non-functionality rates can vary between 20% and 60%.1 The performance of rural piped water networks is less well documented, but recent research indicates even lower reliability.2
Water for Good and likeminded organizations have spent more than a decade developing solutions to keep safe water flowing for good.
This article introduces our 2025 Sustainability Report and provides a Deep Dive on Water for Good’s established service delivery models in Ethiopia, Tanzania, and the Central African Republic (CAR).
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FULL REPORT
Today, we have good evidence of diverse, innovative models for professionalizing rural water services that can achieve over 90% functionality at a low cost per person, even in very rural and difficult contexts.3 Water for Good reaches over 1million people in Sub-Saharan Africa on an annual basis. In Tanzania, the maintenance and functionality of water systems achieved 96% functionality in 2024. In Ethiopia, the SPG model continues to enhance water point functionality, achieving 87% functionality in 2024. In CAR, the routine maintenance visits achieved 91% functionality in 2024. The impact of reliable water services is that we have consistently found that the majority of households utilize the improved water sources as their primary water source and, when combined with the holistic WASH intervention—Water for Good’s Vision of a Healthy Village model– we consistently achieve a 90% reduction of diarrhea among children under age 5, among other improvements in social well-being.
The table below summarizes the three active models and their current scope.
Across all three models, our core sustainability approach is built around establishing rural water service delivery for operations and maintenance. Each institutional model is adapted to the local context and needs. The approaches include trained private Service Provider Groups (SPGs), Community-Based Water Supply Organizations (CBWSOs), strengthening local government agencies, and the direct Design, Build, Operate model for professionalized water delivery and preventative maintenance services. Yet, these diverse models all share a commitment to increasing reliability, professionalizing preventative maintenance, and ensuring consistent and verifiable monitoring.
Ethiopia: Incubating the Local Private Sector
Over the last four years, Water for Good has developed and incubated service provider groups (SPGs) in Sidama and Oromia regions of Southern Ethiopia. The SPGs are responsible for rural water point maintenance, monitoring, and repairs across the Bensa, Kokosa, Nensebo, and Dodola program areas, and are currently serving over 170,000 people. The SPGs are registered as independent local microenterprises. Each SPG consists of five professionals who have relevant education and training, including one engineer and one social worker. Their aim is to provide two preventative maintenance visits per year, per water point, and complete any repair requests from communities within 3 days once a breakdown is reported. With the inclusion of a social worker on the team, the SPGs extend their mandate to focus on reinforcing the handwashing and hygiene behavior change accomplished within our Vision of a Healthy Vision (VHV) program. The team also mobilizes the community and collects user fees as per the respective committee’s bylaws. The tariff collection systems implemented require each water user committee to have a bank account. So far, water users have accumulated $21,845 across program areas to fund maintenance and operational costs.
The result of this model is already significant. In December 2024, Water for Good conducted an inventory of over 700 previously installed water points. Overall, the Water for Good-installed infrastructure has a 87% functionality rate, with a clear plan to exceed 90%. The SPGs are mandated to provide services to government or private companies that request services in the Water for Good intervention areas for waterpoints that were not completed by our organization.
Tanzania: Partnering with the Public Service Authority
Tanzania is Water for Good’s newest country program, where we have implemented solar powered piped schemes in the Shinyanga district. After construction, the solar-powered water supply schemes are officially handed over to the Shinyanga District Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Agency (RUWASA), which is responsible for monitoring, operation, and maintenance. The day-to-day operation will be managed by the Community Based Water Supply Organizations (CBWSO), which reports to RUWASA. Community Based Water Supply Organizations (CBWSOs) are based at the ward level and include a trained and certified technician for regular repairs and maintenance, and an accountant for collecting water user fees and record-keeping. RUWASA meets the salary and benefits of these staff during the six-month incubation phase. When the CBWSO matures, the costs are borne by the CBWSO. Water for Good’s staff support the community-based Water and Sanitation Committee members and encourage the committee to collect regular user fees as outlined in the bylaws set by the association. Specifically, the CBWSO committee members are trained in O&M (Operation and Maintenance) and will be equipped with tools to manage minor maintenance through their artisans. In the sustainability phase, the Water for Good team continues monitoring the functionality of the schemes and collecting user fees which inform RUWASA’s activities. As of December 2024, this approach had achieved a 96% functionality rate for water points, with $26,300 collected and 66% of funds allocated to maintenance activities.
Central African Republic: Direct Service Provision
The Central African Republic is an extremely low population density and fragile context with low state and private sector capacity. Within this context, Water for Good has over 20 years of experience and operates as a proxy-private water services provider. For operations and maintenance, Water for Good employs teams of local maintenance technicians to provide preventative maintenance and repair. The current program supports a network of over 2,500 water points that serve over 960,000+ water users annually over a geographic area greater than the size of Uganda. This service network currently includes the majority of all known rural piped water schemes and handpumps in the country, not all implemented by Water for Good. Importantly, CAR is the only country program where local maintenance technician teams are Water for Good staff and where Water for Good directly imports materials and manages the majority of the supply chain.
Photo Above: Young women collecting water at a Water for Good tap stand in the Central African Republic; a tap operator manages this office and collects payment of 25 CFA per 20L jerrycan of water.
Key Findings
There are some broadly applicable lessons that we are glad to share with other private, NGO, and small public service providers.
Financial Viability as a Work in Progress: User fee collection is foundational to sustainability, but all contexts require subsidy. In Tanzania, the “pay as you fetch” system has the highest payment efficiency and cost recovery with significant reinvestment into maintenance. Challenges around affordability and compliance persist, particularly in CAR and Ethiopia, signaling the need for further financial innovation. A detailed financial analysis is beyond the scope of this Deep Dive, but it’s also an important area for future analysis.
Sustainably Relies on Systems Strengthening Gains: In all country contexts, we pursue a District-Wide Approach for universal basic WASH access (or better) that includes up-front detailed, collaborative planning with local government authorities co-designing WASH solutions. The 2023 District-Wide WASH Master Plan in Bouar, CAR—developed with UNICEF and the Municipality—marked a milestone for local government-led planning. Similarly, Ethiopia’s alignment of SPGs within microenterprise structures and collaboration with district water offices demonstrates progress toward integrating local government into long-term service oversight. In Tanzania, we are directly partnering with community management structures and the service authorities to strengthening district-led systems to design, build, monitor, and maintain rural water services.
Context-Specific Challenges: Each country program faces unique barriers—CAR grapples with political instability and weak governance capacity, and Ethiopia struggles with limited financial resilience and climate vulnerability. In the north, Ethiopia faces active violence and civil unrest. Tanzania faces disparities in rural access and community capacity gaps.
Questions for Future Deep Dives
In future Deep Dives, we’ll explore key questions shaping the future of each operation and maintenance model, including:
- What are the most promising mid- and long-term pathways for financial sustainability?
- Can results-based performance contracts create a transparent and sustainable financial subsidy?
- What are the opportunities to scale and institutionalize professional and reliable services?
