Pan-African Guidance on Regulating Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Services and Small Water Supplies

Effective regulation is essential to service delivery professionalisation and, in turn, accelerating progress toward national and global targets. While often neglected, regulation is especially important in rural areas where it can help to address several deep-rooted challenges impeding improved service delivery, including defining mandates and formalising service provider operations, establishing and upholding quality of service standards, and ensuring tariff frameworks balance affordability and financial viability.  

Recognising the importance of strengthening the regulation of rural water supply and sanitation services and small water supplies in other contexts, ESAWAS commissioned Aguaconsult to help facilitate the development of a dedicated Pan-African guidance document on the topic. This resource is based a comprehensive gap analysis, international best practices, and the progressive steps that several of Africa’s leading regulatory authorities (e.g., NWASCO in Zambia, WASREB in Kenya) are taking to regulate rural water supply and sanitation services and small water supplies. Ultimately, the guidance provides:

• An overview of the necessary requirements for a robust policy and legal framework.

• Recommendations for developing and operationalising an appropriate institutional framework, with the explicit division of policymaking, regulatory, service provider, and user responsibilities among sector stakeholders.

• A summary of various accountability and regulatory mechanisms and guidance on selecting and tailoring these to different service delivery models.

• A phased implementation strategy for progressively strengthening the regulation of rural water supply and sanitation services and small water supplies in other contexts.