Labour Without Voice: Women's Participation in Climate Resilient Water Management in Four Tanzanian Urban Centres
Year: 2026
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: Women perform much of the daily labour of managing water in urban Tanzanian households, yet whether that labour gives them any say over water governance has seldom been measured directly. This study separates the labour women supply from the authority they exercise, drawing on a cross-sectional mixed methods survey of 449 households in Mwanza, Tanga, Dodoma and Tunduma, supported by focus group discussions and key informant interviews. Proportions are reported with Wilson confidence intervals, and associations are tested by Pearson chi-square with Holm-adjusted pairwise comparisons. Because the joint responses needed for an exact interval on the labour-governance gap were not retained, that gap is given a deliberately wide, worst-case interval. Reported participation of women in climate-resilient water management was 21.2 per cent of households, with a 95 per cent confidence interval of 17.6 to 25.2, and ranged from 32.0 per cent in Mwanza to 12.1 per cent in Dodoma. The association with urban centre was significant, although only the contrast between Mwanza and Dodoma survived adjustment for multiple comparisons. Reported participation did not differ detectably between women and men respondents. Involvement in water-related work was considerably higher, since 57.5 per cent of households practised water harvesting, exceeding reported participation by 36.3 percentage points with a worst-case interval of 28.8 to 43.8. Seven respondents in ten reported unequal decision-making roles in the catchment and identified men as the final decision-makers. The study contributes a paired measurement of activity, participation and authority within a single sample, which allows the three to be compared without the confounding effects of differing populations and periods. On that evidence, participation targets expressed as activity involvement risk recording women's unpaid labour as evidence of their inclusion.
Author: Gerald Absanto Sumari
Institution: Moshi Co-operative University
Language: English
Subfield: Water Science and Technology
Field: Environmental Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W7214998633