Nascent Concerns on the Sustainable Management of User Community-Based Approaches in Water Resources and Supply: A Case of River Njoro Watershed, Kenya

This paper is the cumulative work that explores the experiences of communities and stakeholders in implementing sustainable options in operation, maintenance and administration of community managed water sources. Information was collected from households, system operators, focus group discussions, and key sector informants in River Njoro watershed communities. The findings are that 80.9% of the surveyed communities depended on community water sources. Survey data revealed that 22% of the sources were dysfunctional. Reasons cited for non-functioning included that of breakdown of installations (28%), high volcanic fluoride (10%) and drying up boreholes (62%).Water committees were established for most systems to define and manage its operations. Regardless of large number of schemes observed, success was attributable to the principles of community involvement, management, sensitization, education and ownership. This study proposes several interventions for reinforcing their sustainability.