Challenges in developing trust in the rural drinking water supply systems

The contexts and conceptualisation of trust are diverse and can be understood in several ways. The academic literature on trust research focuses on the concept of trust and its linked aspects, such as building trust, lack of trust or mistrust/distrust, which have been studied in various fields (Keskinen et al. 2023). Davidovitz & Cohen (2022) focus on improving the understanding of trust as a factor in public service delivery. Delozier (2018) stated that trust is one of the essential factors for the effective implementation of policies and programs.

The trust research traditions in the literature discussed several definitional debates of trust. Lyon et al. (2015) consider trust to be a psychological state that includes the ‘willingness to be vulnerable’. The concept of trust can generally be understood as ‘a psychological state in which one actor (the ‘truster’ or ‘subject of trust’) accepts some level of vulnerability, based on positive expectations of the actions or intentions of another actor (called the ‘trustee’ or ‘object of trust’), despite the uncertainties inherent in those expectations’ (Keskinen et al. 2023). Bachmann & Zaheer (2006) in the ‘Handbook on Trust’ conceptualises ‘trust as a psychological state held by the follower involving confident positive expectations about the behaviour and intentions of the leader, as they relate to the follower’.

The literature on conceptualising the different approaches to the phenomenon of trust is divided into several prominent themes and elements across the disciplines. Handbook of Research Methods on Trust (2012, 2015) covered six prominent themes: Antecedents to trust, processes of building trust, the contextual influences shaping trust development, decision-making processes in trust building, issues pertaining to the implications of trust and lack of trust, distrust, mistrust, and repair. Feltman's ‘The Thin Book of Trust’ (2008) assesses trust into four components: Sincerity (actions based on thoughts), reliability (acting as per the promises), competence (ability for actions), and care (collective actions and decisions). In addition to these components, Moodley (2017) added engagement as another component in assessing trust. Trust is also understood as a relationship between the stakeholders (can be individuals, groups, organisations or even the states) where one trusts another to do a certain action (Keskinen et al. 2023). Trust is built on the confidence between the Trustor and Trustee through communication and shared knowledge (Shayo et al. 2021). Langsdale & Cardwell (2022) discuss the necessity of building trust in the water sector to improve the overall decision-making and trustful relationships among the stakeholders. Their study assessed the status of stakeholder engagement (SE) practices in North American settings and the benefits arising from it. SE and communication are important tools for ensuring transparency, accountability and effectiveness of development projects (Ahmed 2020). SE is a long-term process that builds trust between stakeholders. Therefore, trust is a key component and one of the principles of SE (Goodman et al. 2020).

Studies such as Megdal et al. (2017), Conallin et al. (2017), Wehn et al. (2018) recognised the importance of effective SE in the water sector. While in OECD studies such as Akhmouch & Clavreul (2016, 2017), SE has emerged as a principle of good water governance. Stakeholder or community engagement is also understood as public or people's participation, involvement, partnership and dialogue (Jiménez et al. 2019; Langsdale & Cardwell 2022). Community engagement is broadly located in the concept of the community management approach. This approach has dominated rural water service management in low and lower-middle-income countries for over 30 years (Hutchings 2016). Although the fields of community participation and engagement are well established, the efforts to institutionalise community participation in India's rural water sector started with sector reforms.

Some scholars have discussed factors shaping the trust between stakeholders. Nelson et al. (2021) stated that continuous interactions and meetings between community members, water committees and service users build a sense of trust. Their study shows that trust depends on a transparent environment and maintenance of financial records. Delozier (2018) focused on trust development among stakeholders in natural water resource management and stated that stakeholder perception was one of the key factors impacting trust. The stakeholders hold certain perceptions, values, and prior experiences which influence the trustful relationship. Thomas et al. (2017) and Yang et al. 2023 also studied the importance of public perceptions of stakeholders. Hence, stakeholders' perceptions matter in understanding the trust. Water and Sanitation Program case study (1999) in Maharashtra shows that the sustained delivery of a good quality civic service can gain the informal trust of the community.

The literature explicitly highlighted several factors that result in the breakdown of trust between the various stakeholders. Delozier (2018) stated that when implementation agencies fail to acknowledge the stakeholders' negative perceptions about public organisations, it limits stakeholder cooperation, trust, and bottom-up participation, leading to distrust of public agencies. Graycar (2020) discussed how the problem of corruption at a global scale costs businesses and governments in terms of raising the cost of goods and services, but most importantly, it undermines policy goals and erodes public trust. This is: ‘Corruption erodes trust in government and is detrimental to the quality of public institutions’ (Graycar 2020). Nelson et al. (2021) stated that conflicts emerged when trust was missing in the person or water committees. Morckel & Terzano (2018) discussed the Flint water crisis case, where trust in the state and local governments was damaged due to officials neglecting users' water quality-related concerns over a year. This feeling of distrust led to the non-participation of most users in the planning process, which hindered the city's planning and recovery efforts. It indicates that a lack of trust in government might have contributed to the lack of participation. Their study also summarised the findings of various studies, which show that trust depends upon various factors, such as residents' perceptions that the government is fiscally responsible, acts with competence, benevolence, and integrity and delivers public services effectively and efficiently.

Yang et al. (2023) stated, ‘Erosion of trust can occur due to breakdowns in communication, perceptions of a utility handling an issue poorly, or misconceptions about the dangers of discolored water’. Thomas et al. (2017) show that distrust in government is shaped by factors such as perceived unfairness, lack of information provision and transparency. Courtney (2018) stated that campaign politics and the distribution of resources promoted an environment of distrust. Saito (2008) stated that in many parts of the world, the mutual mistrust among governments and their people created a crisis of democracy. The changed political environment and economic constraints limited governments' ability to meet diverse demands. As a result, a sizable gap is created between what the government provides and what the general public wants. This shapes people's feelings of dissatisfaction with the government because their opinions are not being heard. The demands of the people might seem unreasonable and contradictory to the government (Saito 2008).

Community engagement is a well-established practice in India's Rural Drinking Water sector (RDWS), where users' participation is voluntary and occurs through village-level meetings (Gram Sabhas). In these meetings, the users directly interact and consult with the Village Local Self-Government Bodies (VLSB¹) members regarding the issues concerned. The water service delivery or water resources management is based on the decentralised approach governed by community engagement or stakeholders' participation (Subramanian & Siromony 2014). This community-based management of Rural Drinking Water Supply Schemes (RWSS) in India was reflected for the first time in the ‘Swajaldhara Program’. This explicit recognition of the community's role was underlined in the New Delhi Statement and later in the Dublin Principles (Srivastava 2012). It marked the reforms in India's water sector supported by programs designed by external aid agencies. India's water sector reforms explicitly recognised two paradigm shifts: (a) a shift from a supply-driven to demand-responsive approach to rural water supply and (b) the government's recognition of community management as a legitimate approach. This was later implemented as a multi-state strategy for rural drinking water supply (James 2004). The reforms called for demand-based, community-managed RWSS, where communities' engagement with the stakeholders was recognised without explicitly focusing on trust. Therefore, the limitations of reforms prompt an inquiry into understanding the role of trust in the water sector.

To seek the community's trust, their active involvement in the program or project is essential. By contributing 10% of the total installation costs and taking full ownership of operation and maintenance, the government sought community involvement from the Swajaldhara program (Das 2006). This new role was given to the community because the program's decentralised, demand-driven, community-managed implementation would foster a sense of ownership among the local population, responsive and responsible leadership at the local level, an atmosphere of trust, promote transparency, and result in better implementation, long-term sustainability, and proper operation and maintenance of water supply systems. Additionally, it would guarantee consistent and fair access to supply for all households, increasing willingness to pay for services. Furthermore, the instances of diverting water supply for unintended uses would be reduced (Ministry of Jal Shakti 2021).

Hutchings et al. (2017) discussed the history and typologies of community management practices in India. Their study mentioned the importance of trust between support entities and service providers as a basis for successful community management. However, the trust between service providers and their users in villages remains underexplored. In the case of multi-village schemes (MVSs), the status and process of trustful relationships between the (i) bulk service providers (i.e., scheme operating agencies (SAs) and VLSBs, and (ii) VLSBs and their users have not been covered in previous research inquiries. In order to fill this gap, this study specifically investigates the factors eroding trust between the three stakeholders.

There is a need to understand the institutional arrangements in India's RDWS before delving into the factors shaping the trust relationship between the water service providers, distributors, and residential water users. In Maharashtra's RDWS, water service delivery is fragmented in the case of MVSs, where MVSs are designed by the Maharashtra Jeevan Pradhikaran (MJP²). After design completion, the management of these MVSs is transferred to the SAs that supply bulk water to the villages in the MVSs. Finally, the last-mile distribution of water in the villages is looked after by the concerned VLSBs. At this local level, there is a direct public engagement of water service users with distributors. The service users are obliged to pay for the water services delivered by the distributors (VLSBs) in the village. On the other hand, there is a direct engagement between VLSBs and SAs, and VLSBs are accountable to the SAs for the water tax payments. Thus, VLSBs work in a challenging situation as they are accountable to both SAs and their end users. In a nutshell, three different agencies govern the MVSs in Maharashtra.

In the above context, this study contributes to the ongoing academic debates by understanding trust in the following ways. First, it presents the existing literature on various aspects of trust and its relevance in the RDWS. Second, it focuses on the empirical understanding of the factors shaping the trust between the key stakeholders of the RDWS: (i) the SAs (bulk water service providers) and village VLSBs (bulk water service recipients), and (ii) VLSBs (bulk water service distributors) and residential water users (water service recipients). Third, it covers the challenges in developing trust relationships and factors which erode or break down the trust among these stakeholders. Further, it demonstrates VLSBs' struggle to restore trust after it is lost.

This study follows a qualitative approach, where data collection relies on detailed descriptions of the on-ground events/observations and interviews. The study's empirical findings are based on detailed field investigations into nine villages of three MVSs from the Palghar district in the Indian state of Maharashtra. Out of these nine villages, a group of three villages each is located: (i) near the source of the transmission network (TN), (ii) in the middle of the TN, and (iii) at the tail-end of the TN, respectively. The purposive sampling criteria is used to choose nine villages that help understand users' service satisfaction and trust in water service providers.

This study used semi-structured interviews, informal conversations and direct field observations to collect data. A total of 80 participants were interviewed for the study based on their availability during the field visits. The participants include water users (45), valve operators (11), SA officials (6), and the VLSBs functionaries (18). The direct field observations of the door-to-door tax recovery process by the VLSBs and the valve operator's task performance were used for the study. Thematic analysis was followed for data analysis. Additionally, detailed field notes and relevant scheme documents were also analysed.

The study presents several on-ground situations that shape users' trust in VLSBs and VLSBs' trust in SAs. The following factors improve the understanding of the breakdown of trust between these key stakeholders of India's RDWS.

In all the study villages, user interviews revealed that their trustful relationship with VLSBs is eroding due to VLSBs' frequent ignorance of water supply-related complaints. Users perceived a tendency among VLSB members to ignore their complaints due to local politics, non-availability of funds for maintenance and repair of the distribution network, ageing infrastructure and other local reasons. Users' trust in VLSB members was broken when they sensed that their water-related grievances were intentionally neglected for a longer time. Once the grievances were neglected, the users attempted to solve their problems independently, resulting in an out-of-pocket expenditure. This can be understood as the coping cost of users. Additionally, this feeling of mistrust developed against the functioning of the VLSB led to users' non-cooperation with the water tax payments, eventually leading to the problem of non-compliance with water tax payments.

Building and maintaining trust is a challenging task for VLSBs in irregular and intermittent water supply situations. The field observations revealed that when the water supply is disrupted for any reason, especially in the summer season, when water demand is high, there is a strong feeling of discontent among the users against the water distribution by the VLSBs. For instance, even if supply got disrupted for around ten days a month, the users were unwilling to pay for the water services received for the remaining days.

While distributing the water to the users, the VLSBs face several challenges, such as frequent electricity disruptions, pressure reduction in the TN leading to non-timely filling of ESRs, and increased duty hours of the water distributors of the VLSBs. In this background, the timely water distribution was affected, leading to distrust between users. Therefore, to mitigate these distribution challenges, the VLSBs invented coping strategies that save them from public discontentment and secure the users' trust. For instance, whether the ESRs were partially filled or not in the designed time, the VLSBs have to cope with this inadequate supply situation. They bypass the ESRs or fill the bore well water in the ESRs. Since VLSBs have to face and manage the users directly, they do not rely fully on the SAs. It was observed that in some villages, the VLSBs provide drinking water services to the users through their own groundwater-based drinking water schemes rather than relying on the MVSs.

The user's service dissatisfaction arose because of the poor quality of water supplied, non-adherence to the distribution schedule, limited supply hours, variable supply timings, unmet water demands, and increased coping costs to meet their demands. For instance, in two of the tail-end villages, the water is distributed during night hours, and most users cannot access water because of discomfort in water collection. One of the users shared his feelings: ‘My family work as labourers, and we are tired because of day's work, and that is why we cannot afford to spend night hours fetching water. If we spend the night hours for water, our work will be affected the next day. We require water but can not fetch it, and our request to change the distribution timings is neglected by the VLSB’.

In another instance, most of the users from six of the study villages were aware that they were supplied with untreated water and perceived that the quality of water supplied was poor. Hence, they started using water for domestic purposes only. In another situation where supply was disrupted, some users perceived that the VLSB members did not make adequate efforts to resume supply. Due to the disruption, users were directly affected as alternate supply was unavailable within the village or costly during summer. To mitigate the disruption situation, they were forced to spend significantly on alternate water supply options outside the village. This brings significant coping costs to the users. These diverse village-specific service dissatisfaction situations led to the erosion of trustful relationships between users and the VLSBs.

Some users said that the ‘VLSB did not inform us regarding the schedule of the village level meetings, which is why we could not attend them’. These meetings are the platform for discussion and dialogue where users directly raise their issues and seek explanations from the VLSB members. When the users were not informed about such meetings, they could not participate and thus were excluded from the decision-making. Their problems were not highlighted or acknowledged by the VLSBs and thus remained neglected. Thus, users' non-participation in decision-making undermined their trust in the VLSBs.

The present efforts to supply water by the SAs to the VLSBs and from them to the end users are not accounted for, as none of these agencies install the water meters. This unaccounted water supply means there is no measure of how many litres were actually supplied by SAs to the VLSBs and to their end users. The field observations revealed that most ESRs were non-functional, and bypass systems were practised. A bypass system (bypassing of ESRs) means the ESRs were not used for the primary and secondary network divisions. Due to practising the bypass system, the quantity of water supplied, consumed and lost during the transmission and distribution of supply was not accounted for. In such a situation, the amount of water a village receives and supplies to the users is unknown to all stakeholders. Due to these limitations, the tariff policy is not realistic, i.e., it is not consumption-based. Thus, the water bills are based on the average consumption rather than actual consumption. In this background, when the supply was disrupted for around 10–15 days in a month, there was a demand from the VLSBs to give concessions in their water bills. They raised concerns about why they should pay the whole month's water bill if they receive water for half of the days in a month. Such a situation created conflicts among the SAs and VLSBs. It eroded the trust between them.

In another scenario of tail-end villages, low pressure in the TN was observed due to factors such as electricity disruptions at the pump station, water theft by the intermediate villages (through secrete valve operations or their secrete practice of the bypass system), unidentified or neglected leakages in the network and improper valve operations by the valve operators. When the pressure in the network was reduced due to these factors, the ESRs of the tail-end villages remained only partially filled, resulting in inadequate supply and leading to the exclusion of most of the users. As most of the ESRs are bypassed, no mechanism is available with the SAs and VLSBs to understand whether the desired quantity of water is being supplied to the users. The SAs authorities claimed, ‘We supplied water for the designed hours’. However, the VLSB functionaries counterclaimed, ‘Desired water services were not supplied to us’. Without water meters, none of these SAs and VLSBs authorities could prove how much water was actually supplied and consumed. Therefore, the unaccounted supply system creates tension between the two water service providers. The trust between the VLSBs and SAs remained compromised as the system supplies unaccounted water.

Continuing with the above background, the water supply is not accounted for and is also unmeasured at the user's end. That is, how many litres of water is accessed by the users through their tap connections was not known in the present unaccounted water supply regime. It was observed that when the tax collectors of the VLSB reached out to the users for water tax recovery, the users started raising their grievances. Even if water is not supplied for 5–6 days a month, they are unwilling to pay for the services received for the rest of the month. Most users from the tail-end villages demanded water every day on a par with the villages located near the source of the MVSs. Here, the trust between the VLSB and the users diminished due to poor water service delivery. Although the VLSBs depend on the bulk water supplied by the SAs, they are responsible for the decentralised delivery and management of the MVSs in the villages. The VLSBs received legitimacy from the trust which communities invest in them. The trust is constructed by the democratic process of elections, but sustaining and maintaining the trust necessitates effective water service delivery. Thus, trust is an essential factor here to realise democratic engagement.

The above situations of low trust created an environment of suspicion, and trust is not nurtured out of inadequate service delivery. The author believes that to restore the trust among the stakeholders and make them accountable for the water supplied and consumed, the unaccounted water supply regime needs to be transformed into an accounted system. This could be done only by installing the water meters at the ESRs and the individual tap connections. The field visits in some villages showed that the metering to the individual tap connections brings transparency and accountability in the last-mile service delivery. This metering practice improved the trust between the VLSBs and the users as both were accountable to each other for the services delivered and consumed. The realistic meter reading indicates a realistic consumption pattern for service providers and users. This strengthens the trust among each other.

During the field visits, it was found that when the VLSBs neglected the users' grievances other than those related to water, this situation eroded their trust in the VLSBs. For instance, in one of the VLSBs, the user was arguing with the VLSB authorities and demanding the reinstallation of the street lamps in front of his house. The street lamp in front of his house was not functional, and the user said, ‘I will not pay taxes until and unless the street lamp is replaced’. While the official of the VLSB said to that user: ‘Why are you stopping tax payments to VLSB as you are accessing the same street where all other street lamps are functional, and you are thinking very individually’. This incident shows a low-trust situation due to grievances other than water.

The problem of corruption in the VLSBs costs them in terms of the breakdown of trust and reputational loss. During field visits, it was found that one of the VLSBs has a history of corruption where one of the members was involved in taking bribes while another official committed suicide due to being trapped in a corruption case. These incidents indicate that the VLSB suffered a significant loss of trust and reputation. These incidents show that the VLSB is struggling to maintain public trust and deliver on the community's expectations in a responsible way. Users in that village said, ‘We do not expect anything more from our VLSB members as they all are corrupt’. This corruption problem in the VLSBs affected the environment of trust in the village. Due to this incident, some users started neglecting the village-level meetings, and their reduced participation in knowledge sharing and the overall decision-making process widened a trust deficit between users and VLSB.

The user interviews and direct field observations revealed that the users whose water needs are unmet by the insufficient supply perceive that the water is inequitably distributed due to the improper valve operations by the VLSBs valve operators. They were informed that the valve operators intentionally opened the valves partially to supply water with low pressure, i.e., they only opened a few threads of the valves. One of the users explained that ‘If the valve has 25 threads, then the valve operator generally opens only a few (around 10) threads. Due to these half-valve operations, the pressure in the distribution network is reduced, and less water is supplied to us’. Users' tacit understanding of valve operations led to their perceived mistrust of the valve operators.

In another instance, the users felt unfairness when supply timings were not followed. When the VLSB valve operators followed the VLSB members' instructions to divert supply to other areas or used their discretion during a supply disruption, the distribution schedule for a few areas collapsed. In such a puzzling water management setting, strict timings for distribution are not maintained, as the valve operator has to manage the distribution in all the remaining areas of the village. Such an on-ground situation mostly forced him to practice water rationing. On the other hand, the users are interested in the distribution of their particular zone/area of the village. They felt unfairness when they perceived the valve operator giving more water to their own and VLSB members' residence zones. They also sensed that the VLSB valve operator mostly took orders from the VLSB members, which further led to a breakdown of trust in the functioning of the VLSBs.

The water distribution at the village level depended on the bulk water supplied by the valve operators of the SAs, who looked after the TN. A problem of non-coordination among these two valve operators of SAs and VLSBs was observed in a few supply disruption situations. This led to the VLSBs' distrust of the authorities of the SAs. Several complaints of the VLSB authorities regarding the inadequate water supply were found on the records, and there were even a few cases against the SAs valve operator. This problem of non-coordination gave rise to the breakdown of trust among the VLSBs and SAs.

The trustful relationship between residential water users and VLSBs is deteriorating because of their poor performance in water service delivery. The last mile water service delivery, that is, providing water to the users located on the last mile of the network, is deteriorated. This was mainly due to the inadequate pressure in the network, which forced users to opt for improper water connections. The VLSBs have the authority to provide the tap connections to the users in the villages. However, the users took connections without informing the VLSBs, and horizontal and bottom connections were taken instead of designed vertical connections. Horizontal and bottom connections were taken at any side and bottom of the pipe, respectively, while vertical connections were taken at the top of the distribution pipe. There was no enforcement by the VLSBs against this issue of horizontal connections. This non-enforcement by VLSBs means users of the tail end receive insufficient water and thus continue to suffer. Hence, these users' trust was eroded due to the non-enforcement by the VLSBs. Thomas et al. (2017) and Yang et al. (2023) discussed how the users' perception of unfairness shaped the distrust, and on a similar line, the findings show that users perceived unfairness in the actions of the VLSBs.

The several factors discussed above indicate the erosion of trust between stakeholders, which broadly shows the situation of low trust in the overall system. The erosion of trust would mean poor cost recovery, leading to poor performance of RWSS. It affects the overall functioning of the RDWS. The findings, similar to those of Morckel & Terzano (2018), presented several trust-breaking situational factors, such as neglecting the users' grievances and poor service delivery, which bring challenges in developing trust between the three different stakeholders. This study's findings help in understanding the level of perceived trust in these three different types of villages. The tail-end VLSBs and their users' trust levels were observed to be low due to poor service delivery performance. In contrast, the villages located near the source and in the middle of the TN show comparatively better levels of trust. Observations in the tail-end village show the frequent protests and conflicts between the authorities of the VLSBs and users. Such incidents were rarely found in the other two types of villages.

Considering the literature discussed, such as Feltman (2008) and Moodley (2017) components, the trust between the stakeholders can be understood. The findings show several ways in which the SAs and the VLSBs are untrustworthy, unreliable, and uncaring to the water users. When the service providers do not show sincere efforts and adequate competence to deliver services that (i.e., not based on the promises made in the policies) and are primarily uncaring to the users, their trust in service providers erodes.

In the complex local water delivery environment, it is very challenging to develop trustful relationships. To work towards building trust between the stakeholders, Feltman's four components of trust can be useful. Broadly, these components help service providers, i.e., SAs and VLSBs, to improve last-mile service delivery and encourage actions for trust-building that can be applied to diverse institutional contexts and also help to strengthen, sustain and sometimes repair trust in their relationships with users.

Finally, the empirical findings of the study show broader implications for ‘conceptualising the challenges in building trust in RDWS’ by discussing the ground-level situations responsible for breaking down the trust. India's RDWS reforms did not explicitly problematise the trustful relationships between the various stakeholders and their implications for service delivery. However, the trustful relationship between the community and service providers is implicitly understood in the demand-driven community-managed approach in India's RDWS. Therefore, understanding the contextual factors that erode the trust between the key stakeholders is essential and should be the starting point for studying trust-building in the RDWS.

The study started with the policy efforts for institutionalising community management in India's RDWS. The users' participation or engagement with the VLSBs is sought by giving a prominent role to the community since the sector reforms. In this participatory approach, the users and the service providers are directly accountable to each other for service delivery and its payments. Against this background, an attempt is made to present the trustful relationship between the three key stakeholders of the RDWS of the Indian state of Maharashtra. This study specifically helps in understanding the factors shaping the level of trust between (i) the SAs (water service providers) and VLSBs (bulk water service recipients) and (ii) VLSBs (bulk water service distributors) and residential water users (water service recipients). These factors are understood in the complex intermittent and irregular water supply regime that brings continuous challenges in managing water distribution at the last mile of the delivery. Some of the factors shaping trust are frequent supply disruption, unaccounted water supply, users' perceived improper valve operations and service dissatisfaction. These identified factors are the key contributors to the breakdown of trust between the stakeholders, creating an environment of mistrust in the system. The VLSBs are working to secure the trust of residential water users by inventing trust-gaining strategies such as providing water from alternate sources like borewells and other private sources. Moreover, VLSBs have also spent significantly on developing new alternate supply sources, like borewells and hand pumps. Some VLSBs used novel trust-gaining strategies, such as installing meters to the users' tap connections to strengthen trust and bring more transparency and accountability in service delivery.

Therefore, the study's findings offered insights into how the on-ground factors erode the trust between the stakeholders and contributed to exploring the scope for inventing novel trust-gaining strategies to engage the stakeholders effectively and build and maintain trust in the rural water supply systems. This will help key policy actors, makers and implementors to problematise on trust and conceptualise its aspects, such as innovative trust-building strategies to secure trust. This study suggests that a ‘lack of trust or trust breakdown’ should be the starting point of future research inquiries on building trust. Building trust with stakeholders requires assessment of the trust between the various stakeholders as it is not a one-step process, but is practised through democratic, participatory engagement processes. In the long run, sustaining the trust of the stakeholders requires the next round of reforms in the sector.

All relevant data are included in the paper or its Supplementary Information.

The authors declare there is no conflict.