Professionalising water services in the rural water sub-sector of Ghana: a partnership to drive change

Sára Bori’s work is shaped by an early, lived understanding of how water systems touch everyday life. In the Netherlands, through a grandfather who settled in the 1980s in a town newly carved from the sea, and an aunt who made her home on a boat. In rural Hungary, her family relied on self‑supply, so during her childhood years she had to get drinking water from her grandmother’s piped town connection because the water at home was unsafe to drink. More than 30 years later, she lives in the same region and sees how those self‑supply challenges persist and are now exacerbated by climate change. These stories continue to guide how she understands development, inequality and public systems. 

Sára works at the intersection of knowledge, evidence and influence. As a knowledge management and communications expert, she helps institutions harvest outcomes and lessons as systems evolve, ensuring that learning travels between countries, organisations and levels of decision‑making. A core part of this work is translating complex evidence into high‑quality publications and audiovisual products – through openness to innovation, rigorous editorial processes and publishing to recognised quality standards - so that insights are credible, accessible and fit for purpose. Her attention to detail, combined with strong project management skills, ensures that complex, multi‑stakeholder initiatives are delivered with clarity, coherence and care. 

Over the past decade, Sara has led flagship knowledge and communications initiatives in the water and sanitation sector with global reach. Across her work, she keeps returning to one question: who benefits when systems function – and who pays the price when they don’t? Seeing how access to water creates and reinforces social divides, she consistently interrogates the ultimate goal of generating, sharing and using knowledge: achieving social justice for all. 

A few highlights

• Over 10 years’ experience in global knowledge management, communications and learning for systems change
• Adviser to the Government of the Netherlands on strategic communications for World Water Week (2020–2026) and the UN 2023 Water Conference
• Co‑author of UNICEF’s WASH Knowledge Management Strategy 2022–2025
• Knowledge management lead for All Systems Connect 2023, international symposium, The Hague, the Netherlands
• Communications lead for All Systems Go Africa 2022, supporting national water, sanitation and hygiene systems strengthening across the African continent
• Project manager of annual reports, strategies and organisational annual planning for over eight years
• Keen implementer of outcome harvesting to capture stories of change
• Working languages: English, Dutch, Hungarian