** ** *Water and Sanitation Program* * *
*FY2006 Business Plan* * * * * *October 2005* * based on the information from the Website of **the WSP SA. It is solidly involved with JNNURM* * * * * * * * * *S**OUTH **A**SIA*** *The Challenge*: South Asia has found it difficult to progress towards the WSS MDG, and in fact coverage has declined in many areas. No city in the region has 24 hour water supply, while arsenic contamination and poor maintenance hamper access in rural areas. The key problems are institutional, not technical or financial. Service providers are not accountable to customers, incentives favor capital works projects rather than sustainable service delivery, and subsidies do not benefit the poor. Inadequate knowledge and lack of systematic policy reform mean change mostly occurs by stealth, and not on scale. *Opportunities: *The institutional constraints to WSS delivery are beginning to be recognized, which offers opportunities for WSP-SA to support the necessary reforms. *WSP-SA's Role*: WSP-SA's core message is that it is not the pipes that need fixing, but the institutions. Advocacy, advisory services and knowledge sharing on water and sanitation projects in isolation cannot achieve this on scale. WSP-SA therefore engages at different levels – from region-wide knowledge sharing to supporting national policy reform, to working with sub-national clients and partners on strategy design and the development of fiscal financing mechanisms conducive to service delivery. *WSP-SA's Comparative Advantage*: WSP-SA is uniquely positioned as an honest broker in the WSS sector without a political, lending or bottom-line agenda and with rapid and flexible access to the joint knowledge of donor organizations and international expertise. *Strategic Activity Selection*: WSP-SA is currently active in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan. To make an impact on scale, WSP-SA has organized its work around themes and programs, at three levels. Although related to each other, they make it possible to focus on the key areas of impact. First, from a water and sanitation perspective, WSP-SA helps shaping effective relations between levels of government, supported by appropriate policies. Second, with operational challenges in the WSS sector as an entry point, it helps building sub-national institutions that deliver services responsive to customer demand, especially to the needs of the poor. Third, in fiscal year 2006 concerted efforts will be made to develop and strengthen regional linkages and programs across South Asia, possibly including Sri Lanka, to facilitate policy dialogue and knowledge sharing about WSS management and its broader institutional requirements. *Key activities*: With its emphasis in catalyzing institutional change on scale for more efficient and accountable water delivery, WSP-SA will: • Help build a critical mass of informed WSS stakeholders across South Asia; • In Bangladesh, build on community-based projects to support the introduction of new water management institutions. • In India, assist reform of national urban policy and fiscal relations reform as well as of urban and rural water and sanitation service providers; • In Pakistan, support water service institutions within the new decentralized system; * * * * *India*** *The Challenge: *India has committed itself to 100% WSS coverage by 2007, eight years before the MDG targets. However, while this promise has driven new investment (e.g., under the Accelerated Rural Water and Sanitation Program) past investments have been poorly maintained. Even worse off than the rural areas, no Indian city or town has 24 hour, 7 days/week water supply. Systemic reform in governance and service delivery is required. Although the Constitution designates authority for WSS to the local level, supply remains centrally-driven – in rural areas through State level government departments and in urban areas through water utilities, neither of which is accountable to their South Asia FY06 Business Plan Pg 48 clients. The fiscal system mainly entails central-to-state-to-local transfers, but volatility in the annual release of funds and weak policies and performance incentives discourage local-level multi-year planning and retard the quality of services, such as WSS, and economic development. In response, GoI's National Urban Renewal Mission (NURM) announced in 2005 aims to provide fiscal incentives to state and city governments for urban sector reform. And demand responsive, community led rural programs initiated in 1999 and scaled up in 2002 under the Swajaldhara program, is now supported by a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) model that sets a central framework for states to choose their strategy and access fiscal incentives. *Opportunities: *The NURM presents an opportunity to advocate policy and institutional reform at different levels to support sustainable WSS service delivery. Local governments are also under increasing regulatory and public pressure to address their shortcomings in solid waste management. Progress with state sector assessments and the demand-led rural sanitation strategy in pilot districts of Maharashtra can be consolidated to support policy change and improved implementation. *WSP-SA's Role: *WSP-SA engages and advises policy makers on policy reform and implementation across the WSS sector, but it also uses local pilot projects as a basis from which to inform reforms of local and intergovernmental systems and incentives. *WSP-SA's Comparative Advantage: *WSP-SA is able to provide technical advice on institutional and policy change from a WSS service delivery point of view. Being unencumbered by a lending or other external agenda lends it credibility. *WSP-SA's Strategic Activity Selection: *Activities will seek to support the new reform momentum in the urban sector, further state sector transformation policies and plans, and take forward the agendas on performance enhancement (through M&E and benchmarking), demand-led rural sanitation strategies and solid waste management. *Key Projects: *Given these strategic opportunities, the key projects in India will be: • The principal urban project is working with the GoI to take the NURM forward, especially enhancing fiscal incentives for local WSS service delivery (This includes consolidating and applying the findings of rapid city assessments done in 2004-05). • In rural context, State Sector Assessments lay the ground for WSS sector transformation and the message from the Demand-Led Rural Sanitation pilots in Maharashtra is to be tested more widely. Solid Waste management is another priority. _______________________________________________ mpisgmedia mailing list http://mail.architexturez.net/mailman/listinfo/mpisgmedia + Planning collaborative at http://plan.architexturez.org/
