Access to safe water is a prerequisite to healthy living and a necessity for every human being. This is in sync with the SDG Goal 6.1, which advocates that all should have access to safe drinking water by 2030. However, safety of water cannot be assured without validation of its quality by the Laboratory.

Consequently, the African Water Association (AfWA), in its effort to improve the water quality of utilities, is implementing a capacity building program (AfriCap) for laboratories of 10 West African countries through funding by the USAID. One of the components of this program promotes partnership between laboratory operators of water quality management, with Ghana Water Company Limited as the “Mentor” for the Anglophone countries, and Federal Capital Territory Water Board and Ogun State Water Corporation as beneficiaries.

Thus, from 15 to 17 april, AfWA Organised, in Abuja, Nigeria, a workshop focused on the development of laboratory quality assurance manual. The objective of the workshop was to support the beneficiary laboratories involved in the AfriCap program in developing their own manuals, bearing in mind that quality manual as a business official documentation which outlines organizations’ quality systems and how they ought to operate is a sine qua non for any meaningful performance.

The workshop which participants described as highly revealing and impactful dealt exhaustively on the three vital components of the quality manual viz; 1)Documentation of the organization’s quality policy which is the position the organization holds with respect to quality; 2) Stating of specific and measurable quality objectives such as standard operating procedures (SOPs), in at least six functional areas and 3) Preparation of a formal document that contains all the minimum mandatory requirements.

The occasion of the opening ceremony was a beehive of activities with speeches and goodwill messages delivered by various persons, prominent among them were the AfriCap Coordinator, Engr. Gilles Djagoun; the USAID E-WASH Chief of Party, Dennis Mwanza and the General Manager, FCT Water Board, Engr. A. A. Nahuche who also declared the workshop open. The team leader from Ghana Water Company Limited, Mrs. Margaret Macauley, wrapped up the occasion of the ceremony with an overview and history of the program Highlights of the speeches given at both the opening and closing sessions bothered on implications of drinking unsafe, contaminated water which leads to diarrheal diseases such as cholera and charges on the need for delivery of safe drinking water that must be of 100% quality and nothing less as a major factor in preventing deaths and improving quality of life: hence the workshop emphasized the delivery of clean and safe water by building capacity of laboratories. 

Participants for this program were drawn from beneficiary utilities of Federal Capital Territory Water Board, and Ogun State Water Corporation. Invitation was extended to other participants from the six utilities under the USAID E-WASH program. These included: Taraba State Water Supply Agency, Niger State Water Board, Imo State Water Corporation, Delta State Urban Water Board, Abia State Water Board, Sokoto State Water Board, And a foreign delegate from Guma Valley Water Company, Sierra Leone.