USAID invests in water quality phone app

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has invested $100,000 in an application created by non-profit tech startup mWater for mobile phone users to instantly test and analyse water quality from local sources.

The information obtained from the app can also be shared on the company’s global, open-source water monitoring database.

The first stage of funding from USAID’s Development Innovation Ventures (DIV) initiative will allow the company and its partners in Mwanza, Tanzania to establish a supply chain for test equipment used with the app, and to implement the mobile-based water monitoring system.

During a nine-month pilot, local health and utility workers will use mWater’s app and water test kit to test drinking water for contamination in two pilot wards with a combined population of nearly 90,000. The workers can update the functional status and add notes about the price or reliability of water.

By the end of the project, mWater’s big data approach will allow automated text messages to be sent to water users suggesting safer sources nearby or providing instructions for disinfecting their drinking water.

The company has built a partnership with the Mwanza Urban Sewerage and Water Authority and the Mwanza City Council to implement the project and plans to eventually scale the monitoring programme nationwide.

mWater CEO Annie Feighery said: "Our goal is to leave. We want to put ourselves out of business. We want to create the capacity so that this can exist without us here."