Women's involvement in the evaluation of water-improvement variables towards the achievement of sustainable development goals: Assessment of a Semi-Urban City in South-West Nigeria

Abstract

Target 6 of the Sustainable Development Goals is aimed at the sustainable management of water using different levels of challenges and goals for different countries. The survey presented in this paper involves the distribution of 600 well-structured questionnaires to 340 mapped-out households, as well as personal interviews and group interactions to capture respondents' perceptions in line with the subject matter. The questions examined variables of analysis pertaining to the level of accessibility, cost perception, sources of water and proposed use of water gotten within Ado-Odo Ota, Ogun State, Nigeria. The outcome from the contributions of respondents was analyzed using the Multinomial Logit model. The Logit result obtained from the survey showed that the responsibility of accessing water within a household lies with the woman, as more women responded in affirmative to that aspect (61.2%). A thorough appraisal of the demographics showed that respondents depend on private sources, which seem expensive to get because the quality of other sources could not be relied on based on the judgment of some physical properties such as smell and colour. After evaluating all logical variables, the results further identified the shortcomings and complications of water service delivery that have caused respondents to lose confidence in government-provided water facilities. To positively improve the SDG metrics, the research highlights positive initiatives such as subsidy, cost recovery, and policy revisitation to improve water supply access within Ado-Odo Ota.