Evaluation report: Supplementary Water Supply System

90 percent of Maldivian households living in the atolls were estimated to be dependent upon
rainwater as the principal source of drinking water. Despite this, pre Tsunami data suggested that as
much as 30% of the atoll population suffers from drinking water shortages. The project accordingly
finds strong congruence with this long term development need.

The Tsunami affected 76 inhabited islands in the Maldives. The GoM through their National Recovery
& Reconstruction Plan (NRRP) invited partnerships for the installation of RO plants in 46 of these
islands. It was estimated that a total of 1,000 community rainwater tanks, 6,000 household rainwater
tanks and 20,000 m3 of rainwater supplies were lost”.1 The reality was that rainwater harvesting
capacities were lost mostly in islands totally destroyed by the Tsunami. The 46 islands identified by
GoM on the other hand were mostly those wherein the Tsunami’s infrastructural damage to these
islands was found minimal with little or no impact to the existing rainwater harvesting capacity of the
island. Further, the NRRP through another program was seeking to expand rainwater harvesting
capacities in these same islands which in the short-term reduces the need for RO water. Within this
context, the project’s appropriateness to meeting Tsunami specific recovery needs appears weak.