Nigeria sanitation, drinking-water and hygiene status overview

15 Sep Nigeria sanitation, drinking-water and hygiene status overview

Nigeria is a party to the United Nations Declaration of the Right to Water, which entitles everyone living in Nigeria to sufficient, affordable, safe and acceptable water for personal and domestic uses.The Federal Ministry of Water Resources (FMWR) is the lead agency for WASH activities in Nigeria. The Ministry works in collaboration with other government agencies and development partners on sanitation and hygiene issues. The national standards and targets being followed are as stated in the Water Sector Road Map of 2010, the Vision 20:2020, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the African Water Vision.

The primary responsibility for the provision of municipal and domestic water supply is that of the state and local governments. However, the federal government often intervenes to increase access in order to meet these targets. Although monitoring and evaluation are not their strong points, the FMWR in collaboration with the NTGS carries out annual monitoring on sanitation and hygiene. National assessments on water and sanitation are carried out regularly and data generated from such monitoring activities are used for management decision-making.The waterworks are mostly owned and managed by the state governments, while the FMWR carries out independent water quality surveillance activities for these waterworks. The State Water Agencies carry out customer satisfaction surveys and use such information gathered to improve their services. Access to water supply was 67% and access to sanitation facilities was 41% as of 2013. An estimated 100 million Nigerians still lack basic sanitation facilities and 63 million do not have access to improved sources of drinking-water. Open defecation is still practiced by about a third of the rural population. Some 12% of the urban population also practices open defecation.While 75% of the urban population is served by improved water supply, often people will collect water from vendors and carry water a good distance after collecting it in containers. In rural areas, only about 42% of households have access to safe water. Thus, Nigeria was not able to meet the MDG target of 75% coverage for improved drinking-water and 63% coverage for access to sanitation facilities by the year 2015.

The human resources required to manage the water resources of the country are available within the country; however, the resources are not equitably distributed, as workers prefer working in urban rather than rural areas. There are plans in place to guide the channeling of funds for WASH activities, although the funds available for WASH are meager compared to the requirements. The structures required for adequate management are equally in place and they have the capacity to absorb any financial improvement in the sub-sector. Achieving more equitable provision of WASH services in Nigeria will require re-directing the little available resources to focus more on provision of WASH facilities in rural areas and the need to continue to subsidize the services in rural areas.Efforts are presently directed to the promotion of sanitation and improved hygiene in rural areas as evidenced by the increased promotion activities of the NTGS and development partners.