WaterReporter
From Betavine Resources Wiki
SouthAfrica: Water Quality Reporter
Vital water quality fieldwork is simplified
In South Africa, access to safe drinking water is enshrined in the constitution as a basic human right. Ensuring that water is safe everywhere, however, has been a difficult and expensive problem to overcome.
The Challenge:
According to a 2005 report published by the World Health Organization and UNICEF, 1.1 billion people worldwide lack access to quality drinking water.
In South Africa, the need to monitor drinking water quality from thousands of sources over vast areas presented huge problems. Many boreholes and wells were simply not being monitored. Returning samples to labs for testing was simply too expensive and time-consuming, and sending out teams to intervene was also a huge task.
The challenge which the Spatial Data Management Research Team at Capetown University were faced with was to impliment use of a field test developed by the Aquatest programme, and a way of reporting test results back in a simple, fast and low-cost way. Then, ultimately, to provide ways for appropriate interventions to be made at a local level to improve water quality where necessary.
The Solution:
The University of Cape Town first piloted its solution in the Hantam municipality of the Northern Cape - a remote, sparsely populated and semi desert area with long distances on gravel roads between communities and lack of electricity in some areas. Even getting staff to go around the entire area required huge resources.
Using local people to do field tests, sending in their results by cell phone, data could be analysed quickly and more frequently. The solution uses open source software, web-based GIS and relatively simple software on the phones, allowing test data from field kits to be sent in and centrally monitored and analysed.
Local Deployment Model:
A field test kit to enable simple, local testing on a frequent basis (often daily) has been developed and local testers take responsibility for water sources local to them. Results of tests are sent in via cell phone and in the event of a result suggesting contamination, the central authorities can action a remedial plan. With the software showing general patterns of contamination, allocating resources is more efficient, and chemicals for treatment can be stored nearer where they are likely to be needed.
Aquatest – the origin of Water Quality Reporter:
The Aquatest Research Programme is an international, multi-disciplinary consortium led by the University of Bristol. The aim is to deliver a water test that can be used widely in developing countries, with a sustainable basis for manufacturing, distributing and marketing the Aquatest device. Close collaboration with researchers and potential users in South Africa and India will help to develop a device that meets users' needs.
The Global Development Program of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has provided support to the second phase of the Aquatest programme with a grant of US $13 million.
Water Quality Reporter project was developed specifically to help implement this programme in South Africa.
Links:
http://spatialdatamanagement.uct.ac.za/water-quality-reporter/
