Government-led monitoring for sustained water service delivery

The purpose of monitoring is to enable effective decision-making using continuous, reliable, and relevant data. This data can then be processed, analysed and used to inform decisions. Monitoring efforts have the potential to track interventions, inform corrective actions, guide planning and resource allocation, and increase accountability to citizens for service providers and authorities. They may also guide regulation of services and service providers. While NGOs, the private sector and others can support monitoring efforts or collect data for their own decision-making, governments in most countries are charged with monitoring functions and, as the ongoing local entity, it is critical to have strong government-led monitoring systems. Monitoring requires coordination mechanisms, strong institutions and governance, analytical capacity, and regulatory and accountability mechanisms that put data to use. Information must be available and presented as insights, which support planning and budgeting cycles and inform financial investments. Monitoring should also respond to and satisfy the needs of various stakeholders and support coherent accountability and sector performance management frameworks. Ultimately, monitoring should result in greater sustainability of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) service delivery. This position paper presents and discusses WASH sector monitoring in Ethiopia. It highlights recent experiences designed to improve monitoring capacities, processes and systems and outlines opportunities and recommendations for monitoring strengthening activities. This is the third position paper in a series of five produced through the 2017-2019 Millennium Water Alliance Bridge Program in Ethiopia. It is made possible through support from the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation.