So what do livelihoods have to do with water harvesting measures or the ground water debate? The Nine Square Mandala or any of the livelihood approaches provide answers: The physical base of people is one of the pillars of their livelihood systems. Although rarely mentioned explicitly, it is fundamental to our well being.

Although it goes beyond the scope of this report to describe the whole watershed development activities, a short outline is provided here. After all, the roots of the projects are found in the degraded catchment area. In improving the natural resource base and its management, the people's livelihoods were to be improved. Phase II is in its implementation stage. During my field visits and discussions with villagers the interesting fact observed by Kerr et al (p.79) hold true for this watershed as well: watershed development per se is low in people's priority list. They do not explicitly mention their wish for a healthy watershed. Indirectly of course, they acknowledge the lack of water to be their main shortcomings. Thus the ecological improvements will benefit the area as a whole, as recognized and assessed in analysis of phase I activities (Ravi Kumar C., 2002). Some observations are added here as relevant issues of concern in the near future of watershed development activities:

· In some villages of Kanakanala (e.g. Umalirampur) drinking water is a serious problem. This year the supply by pipeline did not function, so water was taken from an open well with health implications. Many villagers fell ill (discussions with men and women from Umalirampur). [There are various ways to solve the drinking water problem locally and low cost. One option was tested in various projects, e.g. in Bangladesh: A few hours exposure of the water in PET bottles to sunlight kills 80 - 90 % of the diarrhoea causing parasites and bacteria (see www.sodis.ch)]

· Many children in Kanakanala watershed show excess / lack of fluoride symptoms: a brown line in the middle of the teeth can be observed. Bad teeth is a prevalent symptom, but this specific feature is one of concern related to ground water. In adjacent Andhra Pradesh, and to a certain extent in Karnataka too, studies show how many ground water areas show an alarming rate of fluoride content. Is this problem addressed? A short survey could determine whether this is a locally significant issue. Drinking water sources and children's teeth would have to be assessed.

· SAMUHA Kanakanala consists of many teams: Agriculture, Watershed Team, Micro Credit, Adolescent Health etc. The authors experience in Kanakanala was that awareness of each other's efforts and data is lacking, so synergies are not fully used. This observation came mainly from discussion with staff. It is as important to organize SHG as it is to construct field bunds, and even more important to know how the two activities are connected.

· Common property resource (CPR) management is still in its infant stages and has not really picked up. The degradation of common lands is not considered a priority problem of local people. Healthy CPR could bring benefits to the poorer section of the villages and contribute to more sustainable livelihood strategies, thus efforts could be intensified.

· The groundwater issue, as described in the following section, needs more attention.

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