Abstract:

As water and water poverty continues to remain a high priority on the international agenda this research aims to compare two methods that can be used for water poverty calculation. Both indices are calculated for two municipalities in South Africa after which a comparison is drawn. It is found that although the indices lead to similar conclusions when the overall score is considered, when the focus turns to component scores they have conflicting recommendations. This highlights the importance of the index selection process which can ultimately lead to the success or failure of a planned intervention. Part of this selection process should be the selection of the scale to be used, the relevant components and sub-components, and the appropriate data sources. Future research should focus on enhancing already existing indices, developing new indices if such a need arises, and on developing guidelines for index relevancy for specific scenarios.