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3rd World Water Forum: Water in Cities
By 2025, more than half the population in the Asia and Pacific region will live in urban areas. Urban water issues – from water related illnesses to lack of safe drinking water to lack of adequate sanitation and a lot more– will need more investment.
Urban water issues are intertwined with issues of poverty, groundwater, floods, and land use. Because the number of people affected is high, solving urban water issues in cities deserves increased public attention.
In preparation for the 3rd
World Water Forum, the Asian Development Bank organized a regional
consultation on Water
in Cities, a sub-theme under the larger theme of Water and Cities coordinated
by UN Habitat.
ADB’s water policy, Water
for All, includes among its seven key elements four that are very relevant
to water in cities:
- Improving and expanding the delivery of water services requires that support be provided for autonomous and accountable service providers, private sector participation and public-private partnerships, and equity in access to water for the poor and under-served
- Fostering the conservation of water and increasing system efficiencies includes support for packages that combine water use and resource management charges to recover costs, improve regulation and increase public awareness, and provisions to ensure that the poor are not excluded
- Facilitation of the exchange of water sector information and experience
includes stakeholder consultation to increase access to basic water services
by poor consumers, and enhance water investments in the developing member countries (DMCs) through public-private-community-NGO partnerships
- Improving governance is to be accomplished by strengthening monitoring, evaluation, research, and learning at all levels
ADB organized four sessions at the 3rd World Water Forum under this theme, with each session covering multiple key elements of the water policy. These were
- Water in Asian Cities -
focused on water supply coverage in 10 Asian cities (Delhi, Dhaka, Karachi,
Kathmandu, Jakarta, Phnom Penh, Ho Chi Minh, Vientience, Shanghai) touching
on issues such as the relevance of privatization in improving services, non-revenue
water, policy and regulatory environments and the like. The consultations
resulted in the launch of the Water for
Asian Cities Program.
- Role of Independent Water
Providers in Serving the Poor - focused on the experiences of small-scale
private water providers (SSPWPs) in 8 Asian cities (Cebu, Delhi, Dhaka, HoChiMin
CityDelhi, Jakarta, Kathmandu, Shanghai and Ulaan Batar), their typology,
volume of business and number of customers, and the strategies to recognize
them as important actors in water services
- Impact Evaluation Study to
Improve Water and Sanitation Project Design and Implementation - focused
on the lessons identified in ADB's impact
evaluation study (IES) of loans and technical assistance for water supply
and sanitation. The IES focused on how improved water availability has affected
different user groups, particularly the poor.
- Public-Private-Community Partnerships
to Serve the Urban Poor - focused on the strengths and weaknesses of public
private partnerships in their role of delivering the universal service obligation
- that is service that includes the poorest.
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- raise public awareness on the issues faced by the urban sector in developing member countries
- provide policy makers with better strategies for increasing the urban poor's access to water
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ADB worked closely with a wide range of collaborators for this theme, among them the following
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- The session on Water in Asian Cities recommended the following:
- Hiking tariffs— to raise investment funds that can be used to expand coverage—will help the poor
- One critical success factor is a strong champion with political will
- There is a need for regulation and civil society involvement
- The session on the Role of Independent Water Providers recommended the following:
- Recognize the role of small local network operators and include them in water supply strategies by local governments, utilities and donors
- Review the legal framework of the water sector to allow utilities and local governments to engage in partnerships with small local network operators
- Provide incentives for water utilities to work with small local network operators
- The Impact Evaluation Study session recommended, among others, the following:
- Initiate value-based health and hygiene awareness education
- Promote cost-effective water conservation
- Harvest rainwater
- The Public-Private-Community Partnerships (PPCP) session recommended that key pro-poor elements should be built into the PPCP contracts to ensure sustainable service coverage to the urban poor. These include
- Flexible service deliver
- Well-targeted subsidies
- Financially viable tariffs with specific consideration to affordability for the urban poor
The more detailed results of the sessions are in the session
reports.
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