Private Sector Participation in Urban Water and Sanitation Provision in Ghana: Experiences from the Tamale Metropolitan Area (TMA)

Osumanu, Issaka Kanton

doi:10.1007/s00267-008-9107-5

Cited by 21 publications

(34 citation statements)

References 4 publications

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“…The impacts of private sector participation in water services have attracted considerable interest (e.g. Osumanu 2008; Zhong and others 2008). The few peer-reviewed, quantitative comparisons of private and public water utilities that exist focus mainly on production efficiency and water pricing (see Davis 2005).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public Versus Private: Does It Matter for Water Conservation? Insights from California

Kallis

Ray

Fulton

et al. 2009

Environmental Management

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This article asks three connected questions: First, does the public view private and public utilities differently, and if so, does this affect attitudes to conservation? Second, do public and private utilities differ in their approaches to conservation? Finally, do differences in the approaches of the utilities, if any, relate to differences in public attitudes? We survey public attitudes in California toward (hypothetical but plausible) voluntary and mandated water conservation, as well as to price increases, during a recent period of shortage. We do this by interviewing households in three pairs of adjacent public and private utilities. We also survey managers of public and private urban water utilities to see if they differ in their approaches to conservation and to their customers. On the user side we do not find pronounced differences, though a minority of customers in all private companies would be more willing to conserve or pay higher prices under a public operator. No respondent in public utility said the reverse. Negative attitudes toward private operators were most pronounced in the pair marked by a controversial recent privatization and a price hike. Nonetheless, we find that California’s history of recurrent droughts and the visible role of the state in water supply and drought management undermine the distinction between public and private. Private utilities themselves work to underplay the distinction by stressing the collective ownership of the water source and the collective value of conservation. Overall, California’s public utilities appear more proactive and target-oriented in asking their customers to conserve than their private counterparts and the state continues to be important in legitimating and guiding conservation behavior, whether the utility is in public hands or private.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public Versus Private: Does It Matter for Water Conservation? Insights from California

Kallis

Ray

Fulton

et al. 2009

Environmental Management

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“…This ultimately defeats the objective of increasing access of the poor to potable water and derails efforts to minimize the prevalence of water borne diseases associated with reliance on polluted water sources. Osumanu (2008) further laments private agency failure to consider the communities they work with as partners but rather as consumers they provide services to in return for financial rewards. This also explains their unwillingness to account to the communities for their stewardship and activities, which implies the latter are unable to hold them responsible for any shortcoming in service delivery.…”

Section: Private Sector Involvementmentioning

confidence: 93%

“…In view of its importance for human survival and socio-economic development, the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) targets, among others, a reduction in the proportion of people that lack access to potable water by half by the year 2015 (Harvey and Reed 2006;Osumanu 2008;Prokopy 2005). Despite renewed focus on expanding access to potable water, inadequate supply and increasing pollution have remained global problems, and an estimated 1.1 billion people lack access to potable water worldwide (UNDP 2006, cited in Wong 2008.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sustaining water supply through a phased community management approach: lessons from Ghana’s “oats” water supply scheme

Opare

2011

Environ Dev Sustain

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Water sector reforms in Ghana and in other developing countries resulted in the adoption of the community management approach for water systems in an effort to ensure better management and service delivery. However, community management is also plagued internal differences, paucity of technical skills, and insufficient management experience. This article presents a case study of a successful community management system in Ghana that utilized a two-phase comanagement period before a full transfer of management responsibilities to the four communities. The first phase of 3 months was a more intensive comanagement system under which the communities teamed up with public agencies and a private firm to manage the water system. This enabled the communities to acquire hands-on management experience and also tap needed skills from external agencies before a second phase of 3 months characterized by gradual withdrawal of private agency support, and a simultaneous measured assumption of higher responsibilities by the communities. Communities thereafter assumed full management responsibility of the water system and have since then posted significant successes in financial management and operations of the system such that some profits have been generated, there is regular water supply and the system operates without major technical hitches. This strategy illustrates the fact that successful community management system is possible if local capacity is adequately strengthened with external support prior to assumption of full community control of water supply systems, and if assumption of responsibilities is pursued gradually.

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“…Sustainable access to safe water measures the health status and the well-being of a people in a given society (United Nations Children Fund/World Health Organisation: UNICEF and WHO, 2000;WHO, 1987), it is well established that people cannot function well without adequate (in terms of quantity and quality) water (Osumanu, 2008). Hence, reliable water delivery services are central to the improvement of public welfare.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The authors also thank Journal of Engineering, Design and Technology for publishing this work. public water utilities, lack of efficient pricing mechanisms to reflect cost of services, limited government financing and investment, and poor managerial practices (Wibowo and Mohamed, 2008;Fuest and Haffner, 2007;Nii Consult, 2003;Osumanu, 2008;Marques and Berg, 2011;ECA, 2005;Rondinelli, 2003;Larbi, 2005). Governments are therefore challenged in their attempts to meeting the water needs of their citizens in line with millennium development goals (MDGs 7c), which targets to halve the proportion of people without water and sanitation by 2015.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The private sector's involvement in the water industry of Ghana

Chan

Ameyaw

2013

Journal of Engineering, Design and Technology

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Purpose -The past few years have seen some private sector involvement in urban and small-town water provision in Ghana, as the government strives to improve access to water supply services for its citizens in line with millennium development goals. Since 1995, both central and local governments have entered into various forms of public-private partnerships (PPPs) contracts. The paper aims to examine challenges and investment needs of Ghanaian water supply sector that necessitated private sector involvement; trends, and factors that constrain the development and implementation of projects with private sector involvement in the sector. Design/methodology/approach -A research approach integrating multi-stage critical review of relevant related literature and case studies is adopted in this paper. The study is further informed by the authors' experience in the sector and knowledge of PPPs. Analysis of data from different sources, using both approaches, provides both historical and contemporary approach to water management practice in Ghana. Findings -The paper reveals that the Ghanaian water supply sector mirrors the classic challenges of public sector utilities in developing countries. Under-investment by government is the major cause of the ill-performance of the sector, necessitating private sector involvement. Management contract has emerged as a popular form of water supply PPP in Ghana. Further, optimal risk allocation has not been widely adopted in these contracts, and not yet been given much attention by practitioners and researchers in the literature of water management in Ghana. Originality/value -The paper provides useful insights into the constraints of the water supply sector, development and implementation challenges of PPPs in the sector, and prompts a need for more research on risk allocation in water supply PPP contracts.

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Private Sector Participation in Urban Water and Sanitation Provision in Ghana: Experiences from the Tamale Metropolitan Area (TMA)

Cited by 21 publications

References 4 publications

Public Versus Private: Does It Matter for Water Conservation? Insights from California

Public Versus Private: Does It Matter for Water Conservation? Insights from California

Sustaining water supply through a phased community management approach: lessons from Ghana’s “oats” water supply scheme

The private sector's involvement in the water industry of Ghana

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