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Strategic sanitation planning – it's all very well, but . . .
01.07.2000
The Strategic Sanitation Approach offers a conceptual model of sanitation development, but how useful is it in practice? A pilot project in Bharatpur, India has been trying to answer this, and two years after its inception some important lessons have been learned. -
Designing water-pricing policy, tariffs and subsidies to help the poor
01.10.2002
The structure and level of water tariffs have a great impact on the poor – as well as on the sustainability and coverage of water utilities. This article explains how, and suggests that subsidies need to be handled with care. -
Crossfire: ‘The MDG target – to halve the proportion of the population without sustainable access to safe drinking water – has been met, five years early’
01.10.2012
"We can think about how to continue to challenge governments and aid agencies to do more". Has the The MDG target – to halve the proportion of the population without sustainable access to safe drinking water – been met? -
Editorial: China–Africa relations
01.01.2016
This issue of Waterlines examines three very different themes: the involvement of China in the water and sanitation sector in Africa; the performance of rural water supplies delivered by handpumps; and the question of how to pay – and who should pay – for the full costs of water services. -
The 2014 Sanitation and Water for All High Level Meeting: what does it tell us about how developing countries are tackling inequalities?
01.10.2014
The 2014 High Level Meeting (HLM), held on 11 April 2014 in Washington, DC, was the largest meeting the Sanitation and Water for All partnership has yet convened. It was attended by 42 developing countries, 12 donors, and four development banks, as well as senior representatives from UN agencies and civil society. Twenty developing countries were represented at the level of their minister of finance, and in addition, 35 ministers responsible for water and sanitation attended. At SWA HLMs, developing countries and donor partners present commitments designed to overcome the barriers holding back progress towards universal access. In April 2014, 43 countries prepared and tabled more than 300 commitments. An analysis was carried out to examine responses to the call for commitments that specifically targeted inequalities, revealing that 26 countries, 60 per cent of those that tabled commitments, made 46 commitments that could be considered to address inequalities, either through direct intervention or strengthening of the policy and institutional environment.