Water and Sanitation: Solutions II?

'Money all the way..'

Privatisation:

Decentralisation in the late 1980s coupled with the promotion of good governance have shifted the responsibility for public goods provision from the centre to empowering local communities and authorities. Hoping that participation would ensure ownership and responsibility, participatory development was used as a strategy to seek accountability of service providers to users. Yet the multiple failures and weaknesses within this strategy sparked the adoption of privatisation to complement public actions; forging a public-private partnership (Golooba-Mutebi, 2012). People often argue that if the issue of safe water and adequate sanitation is fundamentally to do with the lack of access to such resources, then why can we simply not privatise water supply like how we do in the UK? Whilst this may seem like an ideal solution, given how successful and efficient the UK's water supply is with their management and continuous investment in infrastructure, this was only successful due to the people's financial abilities and already well established infrastructure when privatised in 1989. Thus when asking this question in respect to Sub-Saharan Africa, it becomes a different perspective.

The prospect of privatisation is often subject to much criticism as it encourages monopoly and potentially lead to greater disparities in society. There is also an assumption of expected financial returns on the investment in order to sustain these development initiatives for sanitation (WSP, 2010) and thus skepticism over whether the private sector may not uphold the values of public welfare when investing into water supply and management. This general argument that private companies simply do not share the same beliefs as SSA governments (Bayliss, 2003) has been exacerbated across media and by NGOs who think that the correct solution is through participatory development. However, over the past 30 years, privatisation has become central to SSA's development policies and I will like to use Carter and Danert's (2003) paper on privatisation to clarify why this has become so.

Private sector and Water and Sanitation (Carter and Danert, 2013):

What I really related to was Carter and Danert's (2003) paper on privatisation as they claim that 'the criticism of commercial participation or rejection of privatisation is unhelpful'. Personally, whilst I am a complete advocate of promoting participatory development, I do find that some organisations and the media in particular, love to point fingers and criticise the ethics of private companies and how they will simply exacerbate the already abysmal social exclusions that exist. Surely it would be possible, with the amount of money these investors have, for them to subsidise costs and provide a financially sustainable and rapid option to meet the urgent and ambitious targets of MDGs and SDGs? However, Carter and Danert heavily oppose the notion that privatisation is not a viable solution and highlight 4 key factors that people should consider about the role of privatisation in development goals for water and sanitation. 

1. Sector Goals: 

The laudable intentions of the MDGs and SDGs on an international level raises concerns over whether, once these targets are achieved, are they in fact sustainable? This focus on statistics and facts in achieving the milestones takes our attention away from ensuring that these implemented schemes are permanent. Such targets also require things like economic development, institutional capacity, organisational restructuring and more - all of which takes time and good financial funding to makes this easily obtainable. 

2. Instruments: 

The instruments in obtaining development targets include the likes of community management, privatisation, local NGOs and more. However, we must not assume that the private sector is willing to donate capital (often at their own risk) into water and sanitation development initiatives. We must also not assume that when all else fails, the private sector would be willing to come to the rescue. They should not be considered as a back-up resource. Furthermore, for such investment to be effective, there requires a strong public sector. 

This is also supported by Bayliss' 2003 paper which looks at the impacts of privatisation in 14 countries in SSA in improving access to safe water and adequate sanitation. Her findings support the notion that the impact of privatisation is highly dependent on the pre-existing conditions of the public sector and the physical water supply they inherit.

3. Needs of sector players: 

To achieve the sector goals, you need sector players. From international donors to academic experts, these range of players offer their strengths in enhancing the quality of water and sanitation services where all players have an important role. However, the generalisations of private sector being profit obsessed, NGOs as inefficient and corruption within African governments (UNICEF, 2016), there is a lack of mutual understanding and respect between fellow players. As private corporations, I would assume that it is natural for these companies to want to maintain a competitive advantage and in fact this applies across to all the other sector players. In fact the generalisations of the players are often not the cause of system failures but more to do with the asymmetry of power by such players - thus communication is vital. 

4. Ideologies: 

The way in which water is conceptualised is fundamental to promoting strategies and aims. This often acts as a tool for other actors to argue either for or against privatisation as the meaning of water adapts. For example, those who are anti-privatisation appear to emphasise the notion of water being a 'free' resource and thus argues that it is unfair for those to pay for their water, especially when they are in poverty. However these people also fail to acknowledge the 'costly service' of water. Thus there requires a greater dialogue as opposed to framing one ideology of water to shun the commodification of water. 

Thus although privatisation alone may not be the most effective solution, especially with water supply provisions that are in poor conditions, I do believe that they are necessary and the general negative stigma attached to privatisation should be taken half-heartedly when considered.  Taking into account my previous post on education, participatory development and private-public partnerships, it has become obvious that there needs to be an interlink of these solutions. The sheer magnitude of target 6 for 2030 SDG is too great for any one actor to be held responsible for. The importance of a tripartite partnership has been identified in Carter and Danert's paper where it is also clear that, without thorough evaluation of the specific areas and effective communication between the state actors, development initiatives and solutions will continue to remain unsolved.  

Bayliss, K., 2003. Utility privatisation in Sub-Saharan Africa: a case study of water. The Journal of Modern African Studies, 41(4), pp.507-531.

Carter, R.C. and Danert, K., 2003. The private sector and water and sanitation services—policy and poverty issues. Journal of International Development, 15(8), pp.1067-1072.

Golooba‐Mutebi, F., 2012. In search of the right formula: public, private and community‐driven provision of safe water in Rwanda and Uganda. Public Administration and Development, 32(4-5), pp.430-443.
https://www.unicef.org/publicpartnerships/files/WASHTheCaseForSupport.pdf

http://www.wsp.org/sites/wsp.org/files/publications/Private_OperatorModelsforCommunity_WaterSupply.pdf