Women Carry the Weight of Water on Their Backs in Developing Countries

According to Gemma Bulos in her article “Water, Dignity and Sustainable Livelihoods for Women in Kenya,” women outnumber male entrepreneurs in developing economies because they face higher barriers to entry in the formal labor market and have to resort to entrepreneurship as a way out of poverty.

From Africa to Asia and elsewhere around the globe, the containers, the clothes, and the scenery may be different but the experience is the same. Women carry the weight of water on their backs, literally and figuratively. Worldwide, it is estimated that on a single day women can spend over 200 billion collective hours fetching water. It is difficult to imagine how little water some families, like this one in Kenya, have available on a daily basis – less water than two flushes of our Western toilet. Consider the opportunities lost for women and girls when their day is spent on water-related chores.

Read the entire article here.

Photo courtesy:  One Laptop Per Child

Posted by:  Laurel Delaney