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Water and Sanitation
Information Brief No.2 August 2012
Governance
The world’s water crisis is essentially a crisis of
governance. Improving governance is a key
component to achieve sustainable, efficient and
equitable water and sanitation and is, as such, a
priority for Sida.
Sweden recognises that technical solutions to manage the
water crisis are not sufficient to obtain sustainable,
efficient and equitable use of the world’s water resources.
Rather, the importance of governance to manage the wide
range of challenges and impacts is emphasised. Generally,
‘governance’ describes in what way power and authority
are exercised and distributed, how decisions are made, and
to what extent citizens are able to participate in decision
making processes. Good governance will minimise the
opportunities for corruption, or the abuse of entrusted
powers for private gains. This brief provides an overview
of Sida’s approach to water and sanitation governance and
presents a few examples relevant to the theme.
dimension in terms of democratic opportunities to
influence and monitor political processes and outcomes
(see figure below). In many cases measures to improve
governance, e.g. the rule of law and accountability, can be
as effective as specific water projects to promote water
sector outcomes.
The economic dimension relates to the efficient use of
water resources and the role of water in socio-economic
development, while the environmental dimension refers to
sustainable use of water resources and ecosystem integrity.
Water governance is further complicated for
transboundary water resources, when more than one
country is involved in governing the shared resource.
GOVERNANCE OF WATER AND SANITATION
Due to its fluidity, dynamic flow, and the multiple and
often overlapping uses and users, water is more
challenging to govern than many other natural resources.
With economic development and changes in demography
and climate, countries will continue to face tough
decisions on balancing competing demands from
households, farmers, industry, ecosystems and
hydropower to optimise the use of this finite resource.
Water governance is about making these choices, defining
who gets what water, when, how and to what cost.
Sweden acknowledges that water governance deals with
several dimensions of society and highlights the
importance of an integrated and human-rights based
approach. The social dimension refers to the equitable use
of water resources and is linked to the legislative and
reform agenda in the countries but also to the political
Four dimensions of water governance. Source: Tropp, H, “Building
New Capacities for Improved Water Governance”, 2005
SWEDEN’S ENGAGEMENT
Governance aspects are vital ingredients and generally
mainstreamed in Sida’s support. Sweden acknowledges
that, while a well-capacitated public sector has a key role
in the formulation and implementation of water policies
and legislation, the private sector, communities and civil
society also play important roles related to water and
sanitation governance. Active participation of women and
minorities is particularly strived for.

Examples of Swedish support related to water sanitation governance
DEMYSTIFYING GOVERNANCE
The Water Governance Facility (WGF) at SIWI forms an
integral part of the UNDP Water Governance Programme.
Funded by UNDP and Sida, the WGF provides assistance
and technical support to developing and transitional
countries to promote progress on water and sanitation
governance. WGF aims to make the concept of
governance easy to understand and apply, and provides
practical and demand-based assistance. For instance, the
WGF supports reform efforts in Kenya to improve water
accountability using human rights based approaches
including: feedback and complaints mechanisms between
rights-holders and duty bearers; development of anticorruption
tools; and strengthening capacity of water
actors to understand and participate effectively and
meaningfully in the water sector reform.
reform new institutions have been established with clearly
defined mandates and separation of functions to ensure
effective policy making, independent regulation, effective
planning, asset development, and enhanced accountability.
Emerging water resource user associations assist the
decentralised water authorities to address some of the
chronic problems that have constrained water resource
management in the past, including low levels of
compliance with regulations, inadequate monitoring, and
poor land and water use practices.
SUPPORT TO NON-STATE ACTORS
As a complement to the cooperation with the Government
of Kenya, Sweden also supports a facility for non-state
actors. The aim is to improve meaningful stakeholder
participation in policy making, decisions, implementation
and monitoring of service delivery, etc. When citizens,
including the poor and marginalised, have access to
information as well as capacity and confidence to act on it,
water governance is likely to improve.
INTEGRATING BASIN-WIDE PRINCIPLES IN
LOWER MEKONG
Gold panning in the Pungwe river is a source of income but also
pollution. Photo: Klas Palm
TRANSBOUNDARY COOPERATION IN THE
PUNGWE RIVER BASIN
The Pungwe river is shared between Mozambique and
Zimbabwe and flows through one of the poorest areas of
Mozambique, an area prone to recurrent periods of floods
and droughts. Sweden supports the two countries to
strengthen the capacity of the key basin institutions ARA-
Centro and ZINWA-Save, to effectively manage the basin
resources. The support has e.g. led to better coordinated
institutions with clearly defined roles and responsibilities,
and established structures for early warning systems.
Strengthened capacity of key actors (farmers,
smallholders, households, gold panners, etc.) to participate
in decision making has been beneficial for the
management of the basin.
KENYAN WATER SECTOR REFORM
Sweden provides long-term support to Kenya’s water
sector, including the water sector reform. Through the
The economic activity in South East Asia has grown
rapidly during past decades. This has contributed to
poverty reduction but also increased the pressure on
ecosystems, including the Mekong river. In 2011,
Cambodia, Lao PDR, Thailand and Viet Nam adopted an
integrated water resource management based development
strategy for the lower Mekong Basin. Sweden supports the
efforts to share, utilise, manage and conserve water and
related resources. The support includes help to decentralise
some basin planning tasks to national line agencies, and
promote integration of basin-wide principles (such as
sustainable resource use) into national planning processes.
In addition, the program aims to institutionalise
stakeholder participation at regional, national and local
levels.
Policy direction – water and sanitation
Sweden promotes efficient, fair and sustainable
management of water and sanitation. Sida’s interventions
are guided by the Swedish Policy for environment and
climate issues in Swedish development cooperation,
2010-2014, as well as by cooperation strategies at
country, regional and global levels.
Sida/Department for International Organisations and Policy Support
105 25 Stockholm, Sweden
Phone: +46 8 698 5000
www.sida.se; sida@sida.se