Malawi: BASEflow’s Cyclone Idai Flood Response using mWater

mWater is a free WASH data management platform used across the globe. It allows users to flexibly map and monitor information about water and sanitation infrastructure across time, effortlessly share key information within and across sectors, and additionally record any other data with customized surveys that users can design online.

BASEflow is a Malawian social enterprise working to improve the sustainability of groundwater sources for rural populations to access safe drinking water. BASEflow uses mWater as their primary WASH data management platform and, between 2017 and 2019, provided technical backstopping support to a network of 354 local government extension workers to facilitate the national mapping of more than 120,000 water points across Malawi, using mWater; thereby creating the most comprehensive water point infrastructure database in Malawi’s history.

After a year of drought in 2018, an Intense Tropical Cyclone Idai, made landfall in Mozambique on 6th March 2019, causing torrential rains to southeastern Malawi, enhancing the risk for widespread floods. Widespread flooding began on 9 March, causing substantial, in some cases irreparable, damage to 288,371 households across 14 districts; this negatively affected 975,600 people – an estimated 460,000 being children – displaced 86,976 people rendering them displaced or homeless. 60 people were reported to have been killed, while a further 3 were reported missing, their bodies never found.

Following the Declaration of National Disaster, the WASH Cluster, part of Malawi Government’s post-disaster response and management apparatus, was activated to mount a coordinated response effort to address the WASH-related challenges in flood victim camps and surrounding communities; BASEflow was one of the participating organizations in the WASH cluster.

During cluster meeting discussions, it was noted that, in the immediate aftermath of the floods, there was not only substantial damage to water infrastructure within the flood zone, but there was also the added complication of uncertainty over the number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) residing in the camps. This lack of data made it difficult to allocate resources to vital WASH activities and, without actionable data, there would be a significant risk of wasting resources through misallocations.

Bringing their experience and access to the water point database, BASEflow volunteered their support to the response effort and, with the help of other development partners and collaborators, leveraged resources to address the twin challenges abovementioned by providing and using data-related products to guide a coordinated emergency response.

After leveraging the water point database and the versatility of mWater, BASEflow’s support towards the WASH cluster’s emergency response achieved the overall outcome of “improved coordination of humanitarian resources through technology-enabled data-driven decision-making”. The specific challenge-level outcomes contributing to this higher-level outcome are as follows:  

Rehab and Repair of flood-impacted boreholes in Mulanje District

• Restored access to safe drinking water: the rehab and repair project helped increase the functionality of the handpump-fitted boreholes from 8% at the start to 91% during the last visit at the 6 months interval, post-intervention. Furthermore, in absolute terms, this meant restored access to safe drinking water to 184,521 people who would have otherwise had limited or no access to safe drinking water. 
• Improved performance of the handpump-fitted boreholes: following repair and rehabilitation of 364 handpumps, the functionality performance of the handpump increased from 8% to 91% by the last post-intervention visit. 
• Improved coordination and reporting of flood response effort: the use of the mWater platform, and the water point database, improved coordination of the rehabilitation and repair works and provided an exemplar of best practice that can be readily accessed for future interventions of this nature. 

Verifying the Population and WASH/Non-WASH Needs of IDP Camps

• Improved understanding of state of IDP Camp operationalization: following the assessment of 38 IDP camps by the local government extension workers, there was a better understanding of the demographic situation in each camp where, in total, 13208 people resided as at the time of the assessment. Furthermore, the assessment also proved that that only 20 of these camps were actually operational/active.
• Improved understanding of the WASH situation in the IDP camps and surrounding communities: the assessment also captured vital information regarding water access, sanitation and hygiene coverage for all the operational 20 IDP camps and their surrounding communities through 462 households that were surveyed. Further to this, there was also an increased awareness of other non-WASH needs in the IDP camps and surrounding communities e.g. mosquito nets, blankets and other sleeping items etc.