Chapter 4: Water GLOBAL GENDER AND ENVIRONMENT OUTLOOK Energy Chapter 2


providers of water, food and energy at the household and community levels (UNEP et al. 2013).


At every stage in the hydro-social cycle there are different health risks for women and men. Head- loading, a common way to carry water in several parts of the world, is gendered. Almost no men carry water in this way. The health effects of head-loading water and other types of burdens (such as fuelwood) are under-studied, but in one study in South Africa women who head-loaded suffered neck, spinal and head pain; catastrophic spinal injury and knee injuries were not uncommon, and there were frequent accidents as women and girls carried water burdens that could easily weigh 40% of their own body weight along uneven pathways and roads (Geere et al. 2010).


Women in Darfur using “hippo rollers”; the rollers ease the task of water collection, saving women time and energy. Photo credit: © Albert Gonzalez Farran / UNAMID


and responsibilities. Violent conflict can have negative effects on water quality; for example, access may be cut off by fighting, water sources and distribution infrastructure may be deliberately targeted, or institutional collapse may undermine regulation, maintenance and service provision (Troell and Weinthal 2014; USAID 2014). Changes in water availability, in turn, contribute to migration and civil conflict (World Bank 2016). Women and men in conflict-affected developing countries are more than twice as likely to lack clean water as those in other developing countries (World Bank 2011), compounding livelihood challenges and increasing the risk of disease by requiring them to rely on sub-standard sanitation and water facilities. Women in rural settings are generally highly dependent on natural resources (and thus particularly vulnerable to changes in these resources’ availability and quality during and after conflicts) since they are the primary


Poor water quality and inadequate access to safe water supply and sanitation are major threats to human health. Burden-of-disease analysis suggests lack of access to safe water supply, sanitation and hygiene is the third most significant risk factor for health in developing countries, with high mortality rates (Haller et al. 2007). Improving water, sanitation and hygiene globally has the potential to prevent at least 9.1% of the global disease burden and 6.3% of all deaths (Prüss-Üstün et al. 2008). Of the almost 2 million total global deaths in 2004 attributed to unsafe WASH, 48% were female and 52% male.


Some specific WASH-related disease demographics show variably gendered patterns that are difficult to generalize. For example, cholera can strike anyone, but sex, age and social status can magnify or diminish individuals’ vulnerability. Overall, linkages between gender and vulnerability to cholera are not well understood and there is not much literature on the topic (Rancourt 2013). Evidence on specific vulnerabilities to date show little pattern: of all cholera cases in Uganda in 2005-10, 54% were female and 46% male (Bwire et al. 2013); of more than 11,000 cases recorded in Kenya in 2009-10, 51% were males and 49% females


Box 2.2.2: Sexual assault while collecting water and firewood 60


Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors without Borders (MSF) reported that between October 2004 and February 2005 MSF clinics in West Darfur treated 297 rape victims, 99% of whom were women. Almost 90% said rape occurred outside a populated village; 82% were raped while pursuing ordinary daily activities such as searching for firewood or thatch, working in their fields, fetching water from riverbeds or travelling to a market. On top of the physical and emotional trauma, harassment and rape often also results in social exclusion and abandonment by husbands and families (House et al. 2014).


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