The water access and use data includes data on water access, water use, and water stress. Data on piped water access is collected by Statistics South Africa (StatsSA) annually in the General Household Survey (GHS) and once a decade in the national census. The Census data is published down to the Ward level. To compile this dataset, data on piped water access for households in all 4,277 wards was extracted from StatsSA's Census 2011 SuperWeb database and collated by municipality, district and province, and by urban and rural area (classified as traditional/tribal area or commercial farm 'geotype').The data also covers water use and water stress. This data was calculated from information in over 800 individual reports commissioned by the national Department of Water Affairs. This includes data on per capita water stress (supply less demand divided by population) of each metro, town, and village cluster in South Africa, based on information on demand, supply and population in the reports. Water inequality indices (Gini index and Palma ratio) for water use and water access are also provided, at national, provincial, district, and local administrative levels.
The data was collected and prepared by Megan Cole at the University of Oxford, as evidence for the following publication:
Cole, Megan J., Bailey, Richard M., Cullis, James, D.S. and New, Mark G. 2017. Spatial inequality in water access and water use in South Africa. Water Policy (2018) 20 (1): 37–52. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2166/wp.2017.111
