maji matone: a water monitoring project in tanzania

Following on the footsteps of the mobile water tracking system in India, which we featured earlier, comes a water monitoring and civic participation project in Tanzania.

Run by Daraja, an NGO based in Tanzania, Maji Matone asks villagers to report outages at water-points via SMS. Daraja employees read through the SMSs, then pass along the information to the local district engineer. Currently being piloted in three different districts. Each district has a local engineer responsible for the water infrastructure. If reports continue to come in and no action has been taken, Maji Matone turns to its media partners in order to publicize the lack of action.

Thanks to partnerships with a local radio station in each district, the organization is able to draw attention to repeated water problems through radio broadcasts that report on water supply outages and government inaction. Launched in November of 2010, the pilot will run until September 2011 at which point the organization plans to expand Maji Matone nationwide.

In Tanzania, access to water is a regular concern for citizens; a June 2010 report by the African Development Bank Group found that “…the population of Tanzania is estimated at about 37 million of which 20 % live in urban areas and 80 % in rural areas. The water supply coverage is estimated at 73 % for urban areas and 53 % for rural areas and sustained sanitation coverage is estimated at around 50 %.” (However, the Tanzanian Ministry of Water and Irrigation puts the number of rural water coverage at 58% for 2008, the latest available year for data) For villagers in the rural areas, the lack of sustained water supply means that its important to monitor all water and sanitation points, as there may not be a backup system in place.

A 2008 Afrobarometer survey found that water supply access and upkeep was the top concern of rural Tanzanians, with 44% of surveyed respondents saying that water supply was their highest priority for government action. That’s where Daraja and the Maji Matone project comes in. Although Daraja does not make improvements in water management itself, the goal is to encourage citizens to engage with the government through mobile technology and media relations.

Image via Daraja blog