The Roads for Water Consortium

The Roads for Water Consortium is led by MetaMeta and aims that by 2025, in at least 50% of the countries in Africa and 25% in Asia, 50% of all roads are water buffered. We hope of course for even more.

We work with road authorities, agricultural and water bureaus, local governments, public works programs, local NGOs, business incubators, funding agencies, regional bodies and others. We also hope to work with you if you see opportunities to promote the idea of road water harvesting as well as equal and improved livelihood opportunities that can come with it.

We have among others set up the learning alliance for this. The Roads for Water Initiative started from the UPGRO Catalyst Grant (supported by NERC, ESRC and DfID) that was undertaken in Tigray in 2013-2014 by Mekelle University, MetaMeta and IDS.  This research is being followed up and expanded with the support of NWO (Dutch Scientific Council) under the program on Inclusive Roads – also with the University of Utrecht.

The Initiative is also at Stage 2 grantee under the Global Resilience Partnership (supported by USAID, Rockefeller Foundation and SIDA) to upscale the approach and develop the techniques and the balanced access of women and men. We are also working with the International Roads Federation to maintain road water harvesting in road asset management.

We encourage you to join, share experience, access training and learning material and join in initiating activities.

Please contact us!

Where we work

We have worked in Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia, Mozambique, Bangladesh, Nepal, Tajikistan, Pakistan and Bolivia.