Under Question 4 (creation of synergies or conflicts) provision of services such as drinking water and/or sanitation can be extremely beneficial in group formation and social engineering. Often development work in watershed rehabilitation or forest management takes place against a fairly consistent background of past failure. Communities are therefore sceptical and may be slow or unenthusiastic in participating. Provision of drinking water as a component of a wider forest or watershed community development project - particularly early on in a project - can have a strongly catalytic effect on community participation and hence the success in achieving the development objective. For that reason investment in drinking water provision should always be considered as a component in a wider development effort - not to be considered as a self standing programme - which may look splendid but effectively uses up all the catalyst without any catalytic effect.
Mr. John Weatherhogg