Doing More with Less

Andrés, Luis Alberto; Thibert, Michael; Cordoba, Camilo Lombana; Danilenko, Alexander; Joseph, George; Borja-Vega, Christian

doi:10.1596/32277

Cited by 42 publications

(21 citation statements)

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“…Although prices and tariffs may be charged for these services, they are largely administrative and often fail to cover the costs of operating and managing the water supply and sanitation infrastructure—let alone the construction costs and possible environmental impacts of the investment. For example, a survey of over 1500 utilities worldwide found that only 14% generate enough revenue to cover the total costs of service provision, whereas only 35% of the utilities are able to cover the operation and maintenance costs of service provision [51]. Even in wealthy countries, governments typically pay a large share of the investment costs and often cover the operating costs, for water and sanitation services delivered to municipal and industrial users [10,25,52].…”

Section: Reallocating Water Supply and Sanitation Subsidiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Consequently, these subsidies are largely inequitable. An average of 56% of water and sanitation subsidies in emerging and developing countries are captured by the wealthiest 20% of the population, while only 6% are captured by the poorest 20% [51].…”

Section: Reallocating Water Supply and Sanitation Subsidiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These populations are often the poorest and most vulnerable to water crises, especially frequent drought [3,4,21]. One cost-effective way of meeting this challenge is to reallocate existing subsidies to expand water supply and sanitation services for those poorer households without access [11,51,54–58]. As table 1 indicates, current spending by emerging market and developing countries on water and sanitation subsidies is extremely high, both in terms of overall gross domestic product (1.59–1.95%) and per person ($74.10–$90.60).…”

Section: Reallocating Water Supply and Sanitation Subsidiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The economics of managing water crises

Barbier

2022

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

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The growing risk of water crises, including drought, is one of the greatest challenges in the coming decades. Averting such crises will be especially daunting, given that they are just as much a failure of water management as they are a result of scarcity. A major shortcoming is the persistent underpricing of water . The increasing environmental and social costs associated with freshwater scarcity are not routinely reflected in markets. Nor have we developed adequate policies and institutions to handle these costs. This creates perverse incentives that fail to balance water exttraction with supply, protect freshwater ecosystems and generate water-saving innovations. However, drought is proving to be a catalyst for governance and policy reform, and steps can be taken to overcome the underpricing of water. Several examples are explored to illustrate the economic challenge. They include removing the barriers to water markets and trading, reallocating subsidies for water supply and sanitation to expand delivery in developing countries and reforming environmentally harmful irrigation and agricultural policies. The article also explains how ending underpricing can foster a comprehensive strategy for water-saving innovation that can ‘bend’ the global water use curve. This article is part of the Royal Society Science+ meeting issue ‘Drought risk in the Anthropocene’.

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Section: Reallocating Water Supply and Sanitation Subsidiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Reallocating Water Supply and Sanitation Subsidiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Reallocating Water Supply and Sanitation Subsidiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The economics of managing water crises

Barbier

2022

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

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“…Achieving financial sustainability is a global challenge with urban utilities requiring in the order of $300 billion USD per year for operational costs, without including costs for China or India . In the rural sector, data are limited, although longitudinal data from over 2000 schemes in four countries in Africa indicate that water users will pay around one-third of local operational costs based on a performance contract guaranteeing rapid repairs, while the working ratio for FundiFix at the current scale is roughly 16–21% .…”

Section: Resource Requirements For Scale-upmentioning

confidence: 99%

Improving the Reliability of Water Service Delivery in Rural Kenya through Professionalized Maintenance: A System Dynamics Perspective

Chintalapati

Nyaga

Walters

et al. 2022

Environ. Sci. Technol.

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Reliable water service delivery continues to be a complex global issue that is particularly challenging in rural communities. Despite billions of dollars of infrastructure interventions, sustainable water services remain out of reach for millions of people. Professionalized maintenance services have emerged as a service provision strategy to supplement the community-based rural water management approach. This study applies system dynamics modeling to assess the potential impact of scaling up professionalized maintenance services on piped water systems in Kitui County, Kenya. The study results show that over a 10 year simulation, calibrated with 21 months of empirical data and based on a range of key assumptions, delivery of professionalized maintenance services across the county may increase countywide functionality rates from 54% to over 83%, leading to a 67% increase in water production. Furthermore, the increase in preventive maintenance activities and proactive repairs can lead to less frequent major breakdowns and reduction in county government spending on major repairs by over 60%. However, current service fee income from communities accounts for 8% of the total cost of service, necessitating substantial sustained external financing or government subsidies to be financially viable at scale.

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“…A recent World Bank study, however, reports that sanitation services are generally subsidized in higher-income settings, but that subsidies do not sufficiently reach low-income households [ 9 ]. Though well-designed and targeted subsidies have the potential to improve water and sanitation service delivery to low-income households [ 13 , 14 , 15 ], accurate data on household demand are critical to estimate the amount of subsidies required.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Will Households Invest in Safe Sanitation? Results from an Experimental Demand Trial in Nakuru, Kenya

Peletz

Delaire

Kones³

et al. 2021

IJERPH

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Unsafe sanitation is an increasing public health concern for rapidly expanding cities in low-income countries. Understanding household demand for improved sanitation infrastructure is critical for planning effective sanitation investments. In this study, we compared the stated and revealed willingness to pay (WTP) for high-quality, pour-flush latrines among households in low-income areas in the city of Nakuru, Kenya. We found that stated WTP for high-quality, pour-flush latrines was much lower than market prices: less than 5% of households were willing to pay the full costs, which we estimated between 87,100–82,900 Kenyan Shillings (KES), or 871–829 USD. In addition, we found large discrepancies between stated and revealed WTP. For example, 90% of households stated that they would be willing to pay a discounted amount of 10,000 KES (100 USD) for a high-quality, pour-flush latrine, but only 10% of households redeemed vouchers at this price point (paid via six installment payments). Households reported that financial constraints (i.e., lack of cash, other spending priorities) were the main barriers to voucher redemption, even at highly discounted prices. Our results emphasize the importance of financial interventions that address the sizable gaps between the costs of sanitation products and customer demand among low-income populations.

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Doing More with Less

Cited by 42 publications

References 0 publications

The economics of managing water crises

The economics of managing water crises

Improving the Reliability of Water Service Delivery in Rural Kenya through Professionalized Maintenance: A System Dynamics Perspective

Will Households Invest in Safe Sanitation? Results from an Experimental Demand Trial in Nakuru, Kenya

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