To strengthen multi-stakeholder collaboration to safeguard Lusaka's water resources while enhancing the sustainable and timely access to water and sanitation for all." Cooperation is crucial if the complex issue of water security is to be addressed sustainably. Water security is everybody’s business and every organisation and individual can contribute to improve the water situation in Lusaka.

The International Water Stewardship Programme (IWaSP) seeks to initiate multi-stakeholder partnerships with the private sector, the public sector and the civil society in order to formulate and implement measures to improve water security for all parties. The Lusaka Water Security Initiative (LuWSI) aims to improve water security for Lusaka’s residents and businesses through multi-stakeholder engagement, coordination and action. The partnership covers the assessment of water security threats and solutions for the city and implements projects to improve the situation, focusing on groundwater pollution prevention, sustainable groundwater exploitation, a healthy Kafue River and improved water supply and sanitation access. The initiative is a city-wide multi-stakeholder approach to improving water security for Lusaka’s residents and businesses through improved water management, land use and urban planning.

Project Results

LuSWI has four primary goals:

1. Assess, prioritise & monitor water security threats & solutions
2. Create awareness, education & advocacy for change
3. Develop & implement projects; mobilise new actors & resources
4. Strengthen capacity for multi-stakeholder collaboration

LuWSI partners engage in dialogue, analysis and knowledge generation, advocacy and awareness-raising, project development, and resource mobilisation. This leads to LuWSI’s partners collaborating with each other and other actors to implement strategic projects to concretely improve water security for Lusaka’s residents and businesses.

An example of these projects is the well-field protection project, a partnership that seeks to protect two of Lusaka Water and Sewerage Company’s (LWSC) critical borehole sites from encroachment, pollution, and over-abstraction. LuWSI’s partners are also engaging in a school education and community awareness raising project, which will bring key-messages to peri-urban areas in Lusaka on important topics such as solid waste management, sanitation, and appropriate health and hygiene practices.

LuWSI serves four key functions, the first of which is to assess, monitor, and prioritise water security threats and solutions. Assessing water risks is also part of IWaSP’s Water Risk and Action Framework, and therefore a necessary step in partnership building. On 9 December 2015, GIZ, acting in its capacity as Interim Secretariat of LuWSI, held a meeting to consult LuWSI partners and other key water sector experts to help design the Terms of Reference for a Situation Analysis as part of the Water Risk and Solutions Assessment for Lusaka, to be conducted by international Water Resources Expert, an independent consultant from South Africa. International Water Resources Expert attended the meeting and there was significant feedback from stakeholders regarding the potential focus of the Situation.