Opening Address: 2nd Asian Development Bank Water Week

Tadao Chino
President, Asian Development Bank
ADB Water Week
Water for the Poor - Setting the Rules and Finding the Money
26-30 January 2004, ADB Headquarters

Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,

I warmly welcome you to Manila and to ADB for the opening today of our main program for this year's ADB Water Week. I hope that your participation in this program will be productive and enriching.

Our 1^st ADB Water Week in December 2002 took the theme: "Water for All - Getting ADB's Water Policy to Work." It aimed to give participants a better understanding of how ADB's water policy, "Water for All", seeks to make water accessible to all, particularly the poor.

This year's theme: "Water for the Poor - Setting the Rules and Finding the Money" is a logical sequel for the following reasons. First, it emphasizes our focus on the poor. Our vision and policy is "Water for All," but the poor often don't get the water they need so desperately. This lack of access to water has much to do with governance and the way water is managed. The water crisis in our region is essentially a crisis of governance. Water Week will highlight the importance of water governance, and how it can translate into better rules and procedures that work to the benefit of the poor.

Second, making water accessible to all, particularly to the poor, also requires a careful review how water resource management and water service delivery is financed. This will be another focus of our discussions. There is room for innovation on this issue among all partners involved, including local communities, city governments, national governments, banks, and international financiers.

Third, this year's theme reinforces our commitment to the Millennium Development Goals, including the target of halving the number of people without safe drinking water and sanitation by the year 2015.

Financing and governance were also major concerns of the Report of the World Panel on Financing Water Infrastructure chaired by Mr. Michel Camdessus, our keynote speaker this morning. ADB actively participated in the Panel and supports the Panel's recommendations, which are broadly consistent with ADB's water policy, as well as other related policies and strategies.

In October last year, ADB established a working group to follow up on the Panel's recommendations. The working group's report is being circulated to you during this Water Week. At ADB, we look forward to improving and expanding water financing in collaboration with our developing member countries, development partners, and stakeholders.

Our follow-up actions to the Panel's recommendations will have a strong focus on poverty reduction. This is consistent with ADB's overarching goal of poverty reduction, and in line with the outcome of the 3^rd World Water Forum and the Stavanger Conference on Water for the Poor. We will work closely with our developing member countries to strengthen their policies on water resource management and water service delivery to ensure a clear focus on improving the water security of the poor. We advocate that pro-poor water management be a key element in national poverty reduction strategies and associated programs with external support agencies.

ADB will continue to improve the water security of the poor. We will work for better governance to secure their rights and entitlements, especially for women. We will push for reforms in lawmaking, policies, and institutional mandates. And we will promote participatory processes for decision-making.

We will also advocate innovation, synergies, and partnerships to enhance the flow of financing for water infrastructure and management. In all this, we will work closely with our developing member countries to boost efficiency in the sector, and to adopt more effective water policies. My colleagues with ADB's Water Financing Working Group will share and discuss the details of their recommendations with you in the days to come.

Ladies and gentlemen, Water Week is a great opportunity not only to discuss the need for change and the need for leadership, and to clarify our goals and future direction, but also to recognize and showcase good examples of water management. To highlight good examples, we created the ADB Water Prize, the first of which, in 2002, recognized good practices in rural water supply and sanitation in Pakistan.

This year, ADB's Water Sector Committee has recommended that the ADB Water Prize be presented to the Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority in Cambodia. The Committee's assessment is that the Authority has clearly demonstrated leadership and innovation in the areas of project financing and good governance, consistent with and supportive of ADB's water policy, "Water for All."

In particular, the Committee found that the Authority has demonstrated how financial and operational autonomy, and enforcement of full cost recovery have transformed it into an outstanding public utility in the region. It has also shown how awareness campaigns can help generate broad public support for the Authority's tariff reform.

The autonomy granted to the Authority has made it fully accountable for performance. The achievement of full cost recovery has put the Authority in a strong financial position to be able to repay its loans. More significantly, the Authority's financial strength has enabled it to expand services to poor areas where piped water supplies were previously just a dream.

The Committee reported that the Authority now delivers water 24 hours a day, compared to 10 hours in 1993. The number of connections has more than tripled in the past 10 years. And water wastage and illegal water use have been lowered drastically during this period, as exemplified by the reduction in nonâ??revenue water, from 72 percent to 22 percent. These performance indicators clearly illustrate the Authority's outstanding improvements in the delivery of water supply services to Phnom Penh's population.

Ladies and gentlemen, I have accepted the Water Sector Committee's recommendation, and I am pleased to present the 2004 ADB Water Prize to the Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority, in recognition of its achievements in support of ADB's water policy. The Authority is represented here today by its General Director, Ek Sonn Chan. I invite all of you to join me in congratulating the Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority under the leadership of Mr. Chan.

Ladies and Gentlemen, as we proceed with the presentation of the ADB Water Prize, I wish all of you success in your discussions this week, and that they do indeed put us further along the path toward "Water for All."

Thank you.