After decades of work on urban water and waste water management in some 40 countries, we have concluded that there is no reason why urban centres of 200 000 or more people cannot have access to clean water that can be drunk straight from the tap without any health concerns.
Very often the view is that technological developments will solve water problems.
Unless these get adequate attention, neither technology nor additional investment funds are likely to resolve the world’s clean water drinking problems.
A decade ago we predicted that unless management practices improved very significantly at least one city in Africa would face unprecedented water crisis within 20 years.
There is good reason to believe people can lead a healthy and productive life with 75 litres to 85 litres of water per day.
For example, water consumption in Czech Republic is now 88 litres per capita per day.
Since Sao Paulo Metropolitan Area has around 22 million people, these policies saved 550 million litres of drinking water every day.
Change in focus Technological developments will undoubtedly help to solve the world’s urban water problems.
But there is increasing evidence that if the aim is to provide everyone with access to clean water, then increasing focus must be placed on governance, institutional issues and policies.
But lack of sustained political will has been the most important missing link critical factor to improve urban water governance in nearly all cities of the world.