Governing water wisely.

• Author: Singh, Anita Inder

WATER IS EVERYBODY'S BUSINESS. It is indispensable for human survival, agricultural and industrial progress, and freedom from lethal diseases. The United Nations has flagged 2005-2015 as the International Decade for Action: Water for Life, which aims to implement internationally agreed water-related goals set in the UN Millennium Declaration. Priority must be given to coping with water scarcity, facilitating access to drinking water, sanitation and hygiene, and reducing disaster risk.

The UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights defined access to water as a human right. Although there is enough water in the world for everyone, about 1 billion or one sixth of the world's people still lack access to it. Population growth, war, migration to urban areas, floods, droughts, climate change and the relations among countries and between all levels of government and citizens account for the inequitable distribution of water. Essentially, the water crisis is a crisis of governance. To tackle this, international investment in the water sector needs to be increased and water issues should be integrated within the broader processes of trade, stability and equitable governance.

Poor water governance takes many forms. Conflicting or overlapping jurisdiction of governing authorities hampers the formulation of a coherent governance strategy to make drinking water available to consumers. Highly centralized government may contribute to inefficient water governance. Decentralization, however, is not a cure-all for water shortages; the power of local government to raise revenues and the amount of money it gets from the central government can affect its ability to repair and maintain the infrastructure. Opaque and corrupt governance exacerbate water problems. Even in some democracies, governance needs to be more transparent and accountable.

Ordinary consumers pay the price for poor water governance, such as the "coping costs" for standing in queues, paying for water delivery or for the power needed to pump water. Good governance can help to ameliorate the quality of people's lives by improving delivery and reducing disparities in availability of water in urban and rural areas. This could help to reduce poverty, preserve ecosystems and prevent outbreaks of disease. The prospects for effective implementation of reforms could be improved if programmes are economically sound and sensitive to the political, social, economic and institutional factors of...