When a Pilot Ends but the Need Doesn’t: Why “Successful” Projects Still Fail Communities
By: Fauzia Aliu
I sit in my kitchen with a household water filter that once worked beautifully for my family.
It is convenient, easy to clean, and gave us confidence in the safety of our drinking water.
Today, it is unusable—not because it failed, but because I cannot find a replacement cartridge.
The filter was introduced through an NGO pilot project. The project ended. The technology remained. But the supply of replacement cartridges did not. When I followed up, I was told the full filter units are still available for sale, but replacement cartridges are no longer stocked locally. I found them online in South Africa, but the seller does not ship to Ghana. On Amazon, they exist—but at a cost and through payment systems inaccessible to most households here.
So now, I am left with a product that is too valuable to throw away and impossible to use.
And I cannot stop thinking about the hundreds of households in communities who received this same filter through the pilot.
- What happens when their cartridges expire?
This Is Not a Technical Failure—It’s a Systems Failure
Pilot projects are meant to test ideas, generate learning, and inform scale. But too often, they stop at proof of concept and never cross into proof of sustainability.
We celebrate numbers:
- Households reached
- Units distributed
- Short-term improvements
What we under-invest in is what actually keeps solutions alive:
- Supply chains for spare parts
- Local availability of consumables
- Affordability beyond donor support
- After-sales systems and accountability
A water filter without a replacement cartridge is not a partial success. It is a broken system. A break in the value chain and a loss in development return on investment.
From a Community Perspective, This Feels Like Abandonment
From a community perspective, this experience feels very different from how it is framed in project reports.
Households are not testing an innovation—they are making real decisions about their health, time, and safety. When a technology is introduced, it builds trust: in the product, in the organisation, and in the broader development system.
When that technology becomes unusable, the damage goes beyond the product:
- Trust erodes
- Innovation becomes something to be wary of
- Communities feel experimented on rather than partnered with
If I—with professional networks, internet access, and possible purchasing power—cannot replace a cartridge, what chance does a rural household have?
Scaling Is More Than Reaching More People
Scaling is often understood as numbers: moving from 100 households to 10,000. But true scale is about longevity not just coverage.
It asks harder questions:
- Can this solution be maintained locally after project closure?
- Are replacement parts accessible and affordable in-country?
- Is there a viable private-sector or community-based distribution model?
- Who is accountable once donor funding ends?
If a solution cannot survive beyond a project cycle, then it is not scalable—no matter how strong the pilot results look.
The Hidden Cost of “Successful” Pilots
Across the sector, there are filters without cartridges, toilets without spare parts, handpumps without mechanics, and digital tools without long-term hosting plans. They sit quietly in homes and communities—unused reminders of good intentions that were not fully thought through. These are not small losses.
They represent:
- Wasted public and donor resources
- Missed health gains
- Erosion of community trust
Most importantly, they reinforce inequality—because when systems fail, it is always communities that pay the price, not implementers, not donors.
What Needs to Change
As practitioners, donors, innovators, and policymakers, we need to raise the bar on what we call success.
Before introducing a technology, we should be asking:
- What happens in year two? In year five?
- Who supplies consumables—and at what cost?
- Can local entrepreneurs be part of the value chain?
- What is the exit plan that protects communities, not just budgets?
Sustainability cannot be an afterthought. It must be designed in from day one.
Ending Where I Began
That filter on my counter is a daily reminder that innovation without systems is fragile.
If we truly care about dignity, equity, and impact, then no household should be left with a solution that expires before the need does.
Pilots should not end with reports.
They should end with systems that work—long after we are gone.