Youth-led Participatory Sensing (YPS) Model to enhance drinking water security: a case study of Pokhara Metropolitan City, Nepal

Water supply for drinking purpose with adequate quality is a global challenge. Majority of the developing countries face serious problems in proper technology and management strategy to regulate drinking water quality, though there are numerous cases of adverse health impacts. Population growth, unsystematic urbanization and improper management of the resources are some of the pressing factors. In Nepal, about 80% of prevalent communicable diseases are due to poor sanitation and lack of access to quality water. The coverage and functionality of the water supply system is still crucial owing to the degraded quality of water. In fact, there is no data available on water quality. Despite huge investment in implementing Water Safety Plan (WSP) approach in developing regions, many countries still lack the baseline water quality data (information flow) in the water supply system. Nepal is one of the countries where WSP is implemented for a long time (more than a decade) but the regular drinking water monitoring mechanism is still a matter of question. Studies have mentioned Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) practices in schools and possibilities of involving schools in WSP programs as well but the systematic method and model to integrate Youth/ Students and Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in Drinking Water Quality Monitoring is yet unexplored. In addition, the data accuracy of Citizen Based Monitoring needs to be checked. Therefore, the first phase of this research has developed a suitable design of Youth-led Participatory Sensing (YPS) to improve water supply management facility, including the strategy to support Climate Resilient Water Safety Plan (CR-WSP) framework of the local water utilities and, this paper highlights on performance evaluation and accuracy of data acquired from YPS Model with paired experimental approach, and gamified techniques in designing the participation from training to field implementation, including the community awareness targets for the selected water supply schemes of Pokhara Metropolitan City (PMC), Nepal, which can be validated and replicated in similar urban or peri-urban settings of national, regional and the global context.

Keywords:

Youth-led Participatory Sensing (YPS), Drinking Water Security, Water Quality, ICTs, Water Supply Schemes, CR-WSPs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kS71uqFnjF0&t=66s

• A video link about a part of the on-going doctoral research work in Nepal