The new 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development includes water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) at its core. A dedicated Sustainable Development Goal (SDG 6) declares a commitment to "ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all." Monitoring progress toward this goal will be challenging: direct measures of water and sanitation service quality and use are either expensive or elusive. However, reliance on household surveys poses limitations and likely overstated progress during the Millennium Development Goal period. In Innovations in WASH Impact Measures: Water and Sanitation Measurement Technologies and Practices to Inform the Sustainable Development Goals, we review the landscape of proven and emerging technologies, methods, and approaches that can support and improve on the WASH indicators proposed for SDG target 6.1, "by 2030, achieve universal and equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all," and target 6.2, "by 2030, achieve access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all and end open defecation, paying special attention to the needs of women and girls and those in vulnerable situations." Although some of these technologies and methods are readily available, other promising approaches require further field evaluation and cost reductions. Emergent technologies, methods, and data-sharing platforms are increasingly aligned with program impact monitoring. Improved monitoring of water and sanitation interventions may allow more cost-effective and measurable results. In many cases, technologies and methods allow more complete and impartial data in time to allow program improvements. Of the myriad monitoring and evaluation methods, each has its own advantages and limitations. Surveys, ethnographies, and direct observation give context to more continuous and objective electronic sensor data. Overall, combined methodologies can provide a more comprehensive and instructive depiction of WASH usage and help the international development community measure our progress toward reaching the SDG WASH goals.

There is growing acceptance that the progress delivered under the Millennium Development Goal target for drinking water and sanitation has been inequitable. As a result, the progressive reduction of inequalities is now an explicit focus of the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) targets, adopted in 2015, for universal access to drinking water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH). This shift in focus has implications for the way in which the next generation of WASH policies and programmes will be conceived, designed, financed and monitored. This book provides an authoritative textbook for students, as well as a point of reference for policy-makers and practitioners interested in reducing inequalities in access to WASH services. Four key areas are addressed: background to the human right to water and development goals; dimensions of inequality; case studies in delivering water and sanitation equitably; and monitoring progress in reducing inequality.

While there is significant awareness of the importance of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) inequalities, measurement continues to present a challenge. Sustainable Development Goal 6 includes universal targets 6.1 and 6.2, aimed at providing universal access to safe drinking water and adequate sanitation, but ways of measuring progress towards these targets are limited. Addressing how inequalities are measured, tracked and communicated is fundamental to accelerating progress in achieving this goal and leaving no one behind. We outline how WASH inequalities have been measured to date on a global level, and describe gaps related to tracking how different groups of people benefit from WASH services. We call for improved measurement that goes beyond the Sustainable Development Goal 6.1 and 6.2 indicators, by applying a wider range of indicators and inequality metrics, dis-aggregated data collection, with improved visualization and communication of inequalities to policy audiences.

The new 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development includes water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) at its core. A dedicated Sustainable Development Goal (SDG 6) declares a commitment to "ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all." Monitoring progress toward this goal will be challenging: direct measures of water and sanitation service quality and use are either expensive or elusive. However, reliance on household surveys poses limitations and likely overstated progress during the Millennium Development Goal period. In Innovations in WASH Impact Measures: Water and Sanitation Measurement Technologies and Practices to Inform the Sustainable Development Goals, we review the landscape of proven and emerging technologies, methods, and approaches that can support and improve on the WASH indicators proposed for SDG target 6.1, "by 2030, achieve universal and equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all," and target 6.2, "by 2030, achieve access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all and end open defecation, paying special attention to the needs of women and girls and those in vulnerable situations." Although some of these technologies and methods are readily available, other promising approaches require further field evaluation and cost reductions. Emergent technologies, methods, and data-sharing platforms are increasingly aligned with program impact monitoring. Improved monitoring of water and sanitation interventions may allow more cost-effective and measurable results. In many cases, technologies and methods allow more complete and impartial data in time to allow program improvements. Of the myriad monitoring and evaluation methods, each has its own advantages and limitations. Surveys, ethnographies, and direct observation give context to more continuous and objective electronic sensor data. Overall, combined methodologies can provide a more comprehensive and instructive depiction of WASH usage and help the international development community measure our progress toward reaching the SDG WASH goals.