The water pipes which act the main water distribution lines inside Kibera.

We have just completed our inception phase for our pilot location in Kibera, Africa's largest informal settlement located in Nairobi. The primary objective in this phase was to carry out a Baseline Survey of the pilot location which we are glad to have achieved and obtained a great insight into current water situation in Kibera. We managed to interview 375 community members as well as 94 water points owners/operators in four different wards in Kibera.

The one-on-one interviews enabled us to get a better understanding and an overall outlook into how water is distributed inside the informal settlement, how the water point owners/operators receive and manage their water supply, how consistent was the supply and how the community members access water from these water points.

It was quite insightful that even though most of the water points in the four wards surveyed recieved water from the same water source, three of the four wards seemed marginalized and experienced water shortages 3-4 days a week while water points in one ward only experienced water shortages once a week. This directly impacted with the people living in the three wards who constantly had to look for water as only afew of the water points had water and were difficult to locate in the crowded informal settlement.

Overall, it was an amazing, insightful experience with lots of learnings and what promises to be a huge opportunity for us to pilot our 'Maji Mkononi' model and solve some pressing water challenges in the four wards.