State Water Agencies in Nigeria: A Performance Assessment by Berta Macheve Alexander Danilenko Roohi Abdullah Abel Bove & L. Joe Moffitt

Author:Berta Macheve, Alexander Danilenko, Roohi Abdullah, Abel Bove & L. Joe Moffitt
Language: eng
Format: epub

APPENDIX A

Data Quality

All participating state water agencies (SWAs), the staff of the Federal Ministry of Water Resources (FMWR), and the World Bank team have made all possible efforts to keep data quality at the highest possible level. All information was reviewed, analyzed and corrected if needed, and then returned to the SWA data collectors for additional review and verification. A special data accreditation exercise was conducted twice to address data quality improvements. At the same time substantial proportions of the data items were beyond SWA areas of competence due to institutional and other limitations.

Data quality was an issue throughout the study but improved consistently as all the utilities gained significant training and experience in data reporting and analysis. At the workshops, one day each was given to data quality and data quality improvement training. Each participating SWA drew up a data quality improvement program that was discussed with peers and FMWR.

The study team put significant effort into ensuring data quality by verifying the information collected and checking data consistency within an individual report, within the entire SWA group, and within the entire International Benchmarking Network for Water and Sanitation Utilities (IBNET) sample.

IBNET data were collected for 91 performance parameters for each SWA according to IBNET standards and data collection protocol. The study team also collected information on services for the poor, informal water providers, and gender issues. All the information was tested by the standard IBNET Excel-based toolkit, which had 24 checks for internal consistency of data submitted, and then compared with the data for a region, nationally, and for SWAs within the region that had similar populations and development status.

Every utility had a chance to add missing data at each round of data collection and review and correct the information from the previous year. The three-year data were vetted by each SWA and the FMWR before they were incorporated into the final report.

The project team conducted a special accreditation for data quality that included analysis of data sources, their measurement process, assessment data, and overall data quality assessment.

For most SWAs, population living in the service areas was based on an approximation from the 1996 and 2006 censuses. In seven states this number was provided by the State Population Commission, which conducted sampling and reviewed SWA population figures. The Port Harcourt water company recently hired an external company to verify its numbers.

Population served was measured by 16 SWAs and their technical and financial departments using their own enumeration and services database. In six, the assessment was based on the approximate number of people served by a connection or a standpipe. Four SWAs used official information from the state statistical bureau. Bayelsa and Rivers did not have such information; their estimates were based on metered water consumption.

Almost all SWAs have a system of customer accounts based on number of connections, which are therefore well recorded in all companies except one, where the number of connections was estimated based on population density. The same applies to the number of active connections and connections with meters.

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