ROCKBlue Empowers Ghana Water Limited (GWL) to Serve Over 17 Million People
Impact at a Glance
- $675,000 additional people served
- 29% clean water access growth
- 28% increase in operating ratio
Finding solutions in a country experiencing climate-fueled rapid population growth
Ghana Water Ltd. (GWL) is responsible for delivering water to more than 17 million people across Ghana. Their charter is especially difficult not only because customers occupy a sprawling area, but because the national population is exploding, an influx of climate refugees are migrating to cities, and a number of low-income settlements have sprung up.
rockblue confronts complex challenges
In 2022, Ghana’s population skyrocketed to 32 million, further straining their already scarce resources and leaving nearly 60% of its citizens without safely managed water. The country is also urbanizing at a staggering rate, and is expected to grow 13% by 2030. From the outset, the partnership between ROCKBlue and GWL was anchored in shared goals: ROCKBlue’s commitment to boosting utility operations and financial health meshed seamlessly with GWL’s drive for scalability and resilience.
getting positive results
With this approach GWL exceeded its 2022 performance targets, leading to:
- Improved water quality compliance from 63% to 97%
- Increased raw water production by 6%
- Over 50,000 new service connections in and around Accra and Kumasi, a remarkable feat in an area some 28,000 square kilometers with inconsistent power supplies, and limited funding.
As a result, GWL served an additional 675,000+ people.
Elevated Customer Reach and Satisfaction
With such a massive geographic footprint, and a population growing rapidly year over year, GWL recognizes the need for customer relation improvements, especially in those regions that service lower income citizens. Since partnering with us, GWL has:
- Expanded impact to remote areas by establishing 25 Water Users Associations within low-income communities across 7 regions, an especially complex and operationally challenging task. This lets GWL leverage local knowledge, while driving community engagement to enhance water access and efficiency in underserved areas.
- Established a Low-Income Customer Support Department, further improving customer service in these regions and supporting the Water User Associations.
- Completed Customer Service Satisfaction Surveys in 102 districts, receiving more than 16,000 responses. With this feedback, GWCL continues to improve service quality, ensuring they meet customer needs on the local level, while expanding its operations.
Strategic Improvement Leading to Durable Results
One of ROCKBlue’s key objectives is to ensure sustainable, and durable results. This cannot be understated when it comes to supporting the scale and complexity of GWL. Both organizations are proud that this ongoing partnership is delivering lasting results while ensuring future success for GWL and Ghana’s citizens:
- Improved GWL’s operating cost ratio from 62.8% to 90.7%.
- Significantly reduced energy costs and developed an energy policy that further lowers operating costs.
- Produced a new health & safety policy and implemented occupational safety and health training for GWL’s production team at Weija - which supplies about 48 million gallons of water per day to over 100 communities in and around Accra. Through these new policies, GWL also built new first aid stations and provided personal protective equipment (PPE) to staff.
additional results
Even in the face of challenges including increasing water coverage and addressing customer service issues, with ROCKBlue’s support, GWL:
- Established 50,000 new service connections from 2022, creating a sustainable water source for nearly 680,000 people.
- With a focus on low-income citizens, inaugurated 25 new Water Users Associations (WUAs) within low-income communities across 7 regions.
- Enabled Ghana’s total clean water access to grow from 13% to 42%, and with this continued support, the WHO and UNICEF have predicted this number will jump to 85% by 2030.
Other success stories
WASCO
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LWSC
ZambiaUsing valuable lessons learned in the developing world, we have worked with this large utility to help serve millions.
