SPATIAL VARIATIONS IN WATER ACCESSIBILITY AND CONSUMPTION CAPACITY AMONG THE HOUSEHOLDS IN LAGOS METROPOLIS

Abstract

The problem of inequality in accessing water is one of the major challenges facing the urban residents living in the low-income areas, which has led to inadequate and poor quality of water supply. The main thrust of this research is to access the spatial variation in the water accessibility and the consumption capacity of households in the low-income areas of Lagos Metropolis, established relationship between the quantity of water used and frequency of water accessibility from the available water facilities. Multipurpose sampling method was adopted, where 4 local governments were sampled from the 16 that made up Lagos Metropolis. From these, 12 low-income wards were selected, where 1,532 household’s heads were sampled for data collection. The study found that there was 100% level of water coverage from the alternative, while both piped and other public water facilities have just 26.9% and 29.6% respectively, with variations among the wards.  None of the sampled wards could meet the water consumption quantity recommended by the authorities. Due to low level of coverage, the test of relationship established that an increase in the frequency of accessibility from both piped and other public water will bring a correspondence increase in the quantity of water used. Reverse was the case for the alternative to public water facilities. It means that an additional increase in the level of coverage of piped and other public water facilities will increase the level of consumption of water from the facilities. Hence, investment in the provision of more piped and other public water facilities is hereby recommended, towards bridging the gap in water availability.