Exploring The Impact of Social Protection on Water Security and Women's Empowerment
Abstract
The increasing rate of extreme climate change has contributed to rising temperatures and extreme weather events such as droughts, floods, and wildfires. These occurrences raise concerns about the impacts of water insecurity on the health and well-being of women and girls in marginalized contexts. Within the socio-cultural context of semi-arid Ghana, households without water within their immediate premises rely on women and girls to perform the responsibility of providing water for household use. This calls for measures that can improve water accessibility and its sustainable usage. One such measure is through social protection programs (SPP). Ghana implemented the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) program as a SPP, aimed at poverty reduction and livelihood improvements. In the Ghanaian context, there has been minimal focus on the role of social protection in increasing access to water and addressing water insecurity. Therefore, this study seeks to explore the impact of social protection on water security and women’s empowerment. Exploring the relationship between social protection policies, water security, and their collective impact on women’s empowerment is important for (re)designing comprehensive strategies to address the challenges faced by marginalized communities, particularly women and girls.
The study employed a qualitative approach and collected data through in-depth interviews with informed consent from the participants. A purposive sampling technique was used to select households with a woman who is a LEAP beneficiary and a girl who is involved in water collection. Women (n=25), and Girls (n=19) were interviewed. Thematic analysis was utilized to generate the themes for discussions. The findings show thatwomen LEAP beneficiaries use cash transfers for improved water access. However, to further cope with water insecurity, women sometimes borrow water from friends and families for basic domestic purposes such as cooking. The findings of the study also show that WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene) hinders the livelihoods (i.e., agricultural and trade livelihoods) and the co-responsibilities mandated by LEAP. Furthermore, the study findings uncovered the potential effects of relative deprivation created by the LEAP support on the psychosocial health of women LEAP beneficiaries in the Wa West District. Some LEAP non-beneficiaries in the communities feel that there is unfairness in the LEAP selection process, thus leading to resentment against the program beneficiaries, which creates social tension within the local communities.
This study reinforces that LEAP should be redesigned to include water and sanitation services as part of the portfolio of complementary services for beneficiaries in the communities. Public awareness should be created to give education on LEAP eligibility to minimize the negative consequences that beneficiaries face in their respective communities.