Feasibility Study Of Low Cost Household Water Filters in a Village

1. Feasibility Study Of Low Cost Water
Filters In The Village Of Manipura
Kshitij Agarwal | Manali Motwani | Priyance Agarwalla | Raunak Jaiswal |Sahil Anand

2. The Village
•Manipura village comes under the Udupi
district, Karnataka
•Area of about 12 square kilometers
•Surrounded by Papnashni and Alevoor rivers
•Tulu , Kannada, Konkani are the common languages

3. Population
•Total population of about 4934
• 50 % Muslims ,rest Hindus and Christians
•Average monthly income = Rs 4000
•Total number of households = 1260
•Total number of Pukka houses = 1225
•No. of wells = 756
•Total number of water connections = 292

4. Infrastructure
•Common panchayat office for Manipura and Katapadi
•Nearest post-office is Moodubelle
•One PHC
•One High school
•A syndicate bank branch (no ATM)
•Well connected through roads
•Electricity and mobile network available

5. Issues Faced By The Village
• Inadequate supply of water during March- May
• Non potable water
• High number of cases of diarrhea, jaundice and typhoid
reported in the closest PHC

6. Government Plans
• Plan to pump water from
Papnashni river to main
overhead tank

7. Objectives of Our Study
• To study the feasibility of low cost household water filters
Constructs for the above objective are :
• Perception of villagers towards drinking water
• Water drinking habit of the villagers
• Perception of villagers towards water filters
• Required attributes of water filters
• Sustainable distribution channel

8. 4C Framework
Beneficial
Profitable
Harmful
Cellphone
Water
Filters
Non
Profitable
Cigarette
Condoms
Colas

9. Methodology
•Conversation with Panchayat officials
•In depth Interview of 11 villagers
•Secondary data collection from Village Panchayat
•Literature review on low cost water filters
•Analysis of the above data

10. Respondent Profile
•All these 11 respondents had average income of Rs 3000
•7 female respondents and 4 male respondents
•6 out of 7 female respondents were member of SKDRDP
micro finance project in the village

11. Questions
•Is the water available throughout the year?
•Rate the quality of drinking water in the house
•What water treatment methods do you use, if any?
•Do you know/use water filters?
•Which brands of water filter are you aware of?
•Why don’t you use water filters?
•What price are you ready to pay for water filter?
•What attributes do you look for in a water filter?

12. Findings
•All the respondents were dissatisfied with the quality of
drinking water
•9 out of 11 villagers boiled the water before drinking
•They also used alum (patika) to treat the water
•7 out of 11 villagers were aware about the water filters
•5 out of these 7 villagers could recall only Aquaguard as a
brand of water filter

13. Findings Contd.
•The perceived price of water filters amongst these 7
villagers were above Rs. 5000
•TRUST- a very important factor for villagers- only
Panchayat can educate them
•2 out of 11 villagers wanted the panchayat to sponsor for
low cost water filters
•9 out of 11 villagers set the threshold price for water filters
between Rs. 700 to Rs. 1000
•Only core functionality needed- no extra features or looks
matter!

14. Way Forward
•Potential of about 500 (40% of total households) low cost
water filters in this area
•Promotion of these water filters can be done through
Panchayat, by having a campaign for clean drinking water
•Pureit by HUL and Swach by Tata are two brands which can
be sold in the area
•Distribution of water filters in collaboration with SKDRDP
micro finance project (40% of the village household are part
of this project)

15. Household filters
• Rs 6499
Aquaguard
• Rs 1200
Pureit
• Rs 999
Swach

16. Distribution Model
* Based on Model Developed By HUL for Pureit
Sales
Representative
SKDRDP
Credit Assistant
HH decide to buy
SKDRDP Loan
Company
Supplies the
Product
Company’s After
Sale service
Resupply of
replacement kits

17. Probable Drawbacks
•Villagers could default on the loan taken from the micro
finance
•Continuity of usage of low cost water filters due to repurchase of replaceable kits at regular intervals
•Conflict with the existing channel