Examination of Witnesses (Questions 91
- 99)
TUESDAY 5 DECEMBER 2006
MR ANTONIO
GARCÍA FRAGÍO,
MR SERING
JALLOW AND
MR STEPHEN
TURNER
Q91 Chairman: Can I say good morning
to you, gentlemen, and thank you for coming to give evidence.
You are obviously here representing three different organisations
and in your own right, so I wonder if you could just briefly introduce
yourselves and then we will perhaps get into the more detailed
questions.
Mr Jallow: My name is Sering Jallow,
I am the Acting Manager at the African Development Bank in the
division which is responsible for water supply and sanitation
in North Africa, East and Southern Africa. Thirty countries in
those areas.
Mr García Fragío:
Good morning, my name is Antonio Garcia Fragio. I am the Head
of the Unit for Economic Development which includes trade, regional
integration, private sector support and infrastructures (transport,
water, energy and ICT) within the Directorate General for Development,
which deals with the ACP[13]
countries.
Mr Turner: I am Stephen Turner,
I am Deputy Chief Executive and Director of Policy for WaterAid.
We work in 17 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia and
the Pacific.
Q92 Chairman: Thank you very much.
Perhaps I can start by asking you all just briefly to indicate
your own idea of the priorities that need to be addressed if we
are going to deliver a solution to what has been described to
us as a water and sanitation crisis in the developing world. We
have discussed (if you were in for the previous evidence) issues
that relate to technical capacity, financial resources, different
engagements with the community—urban versus rural—and
so on. I do not want to lead you in any questions but could you
identify two or three issues that, in your view, represent the
most important areas that need to be addressed to deal with the
crisis. It is a crisis in as much as people, especially children,
are dying every day because we are not able to deliver adequate
water and sanitation.
Mr Jallow: In Africa for us, as
a Bank, we think the most important issue is the financing that
is available to water supply and sanitation. It is very low compared
to what is really required. We have been doing a lot of financing
in the water sector, over US$5 billion since the Bank started
its activities, but until 2003 we have been doing something like
$100 or $150 million a year, and in rural water supply and sanitation
alone we estimate there is need for about $1.2 billion investment
every year. At the moment, the Bank and all the institutions put
together who are active in the sector are putting in less than
half of this requirement.
Q93 Chairman: Do you imply by that
that if you had the money you would be able to spend it effectively
in delivering the Millennium Development Goals on water and sanitation?
Mr Jallow: The money is one of
the things that we need. There are a number of other things that
need to be taken care of. In a lot of cases the capacity at the
level of the countries that we are working in is a huge problem.
Water supply and sanitation in the urban sector is easier to deal
with in an environment of a lack of capacity, but where you are
dealing with rural water supply you need to really go out to the
local government levels, so you need to build capacity within
the decentralised local authorities, you need to build capacity
of the communities who will be responsible for maintenance of
these facilities, and even getting involved in, say, water technologies.
So capacity building is very important. We believe in the Bank
that this is something that must be done along with the investment;
it is not a question of building capacity now and coming later
to do investments; we need to do both together. The other issue
is that there are a number of us working in the water sector but
not really working together. There is a need for us to work more
closely together, to help in a harmonised way so that countries
can better benefit from the resources, the capacity and the knowledge
that we can bring to bear in this sector. We need more harmonisation.
We have not all given sanitation the priority it requires, and
we need to do more in the area of sanitation, not just providing
latrines but, as colleagues from DFID have said, also trying to
bring about behavioural change and generate demand within communities.
If people do not have enough resources for water and sanitation
you always find out that even the communities, if they had the
choice, will want to put whatever resources they have into water
and leave sanitation for later. One of the other big problems
we have on the continent is this lack of storage in Africa. Storage
in the UK is probably over 3,000 cubic metres per person, in the
US it is about 6,000, in Australia it is about 5,000; in Africa
it is less than 50. If the rains are delayed by a month then there
are huge problems. So you need to have enough storage to buffer
these periods when the rains are delayed or enough storage capacity
to hold water, which causes floods and a lot of problems for people
on the continent. I will stop at this point.
Mr García Fragío:
At the policy level, though a lot has been done and has been achieved
since Johannesburg in 2002, there is an issue which still should
be pounded on everybody's mind regularly. The last (2006) UNDP
Human Development Report on the water crisis highlights
a number of issues, and particularly I would address the first
one, which is the debate on whether water is a human right. We
think that water is a fundamental need or a human right, and addressing
this point and insisting on the role that water has for the livelihood
of the poor for health and all the conditions that people live
with is an essential prerequisite to change things. So I think
there should be first an international consensus repeating the
importance of water and saying how far this concept of human rights,
or whatever alternative is found to that—as close as possible
to that concept—is agreed at an international level. At
a European Community level there is still not consensus on that
and I think it is one of the issues that should be addressed.
Q94 Chairman: In some of the evidence
we have had people have said it is fine to make a statement that
water is a human right but in some senses it does not mean anything
unless it has a practical application.
Mr García Fragío:
I fully agree with that. I was trying to refer to that as an overarching
or basic reference. I think that next, as Hilary Benn pointed
out in DFID in the last report, there is an issue of financial
resources, which has been mentioned by Mr Jallow. In addition
to the issue of resources, the financial gap, there is the issue
of how to do things more effectively. There I think the international
community, the donors, should try to explore all possible ways
to harmonise, to seek complementarities, to work through the national
strategies implementing them; so it is a plea for harmonisation
and optimisation of the resources; more resources but using better
the resources. The third point I would like to refer to, which
has already been mentioned by my colleague at least tangentially,
is the need to support those countries which are the recipients
of aid to establish national plans and, particularly, to get them
to push water as high as possible up their agenda. We work on
the basis of the ownership principle and we respond to demand.
If there is not a stronger demand, a real demand, on the recipient
side I think it is going to be very difficult for donors like
us, for most of the donor community I guess which react to those
demands, to increase the financial flows and, particularly, be
more effective. The last point I would like to mention is better
targeting. The issue is more money, more funds, using better the
funds, but also better targeting. In that respect I think we have
to work at two levels: one, as my colleague from the African Development
Bank said, is whatever can be done at a regional level, as I understood
it, to be treated through the regions; in other words, maximisation
of integrated water resources management for the river basins.
That is one thing. Then a very, very strong focus on the lower
level, the poverty level, the water and sanitation level; trying
also to see—and that is a point of methodology which has
to be developed by the international community—how we can
associate in real terms the money that we put into the projects
with the results. In other words, if the whole debate about the
MDGs is to try to reduce the number of people who do not have
access to water and sanitation, how can we make sure that every
euro or every penny that is put into that sector is best used
to reach that? That requires monitoring tools; improving everything
which is being done today in terms of seeing how not only the
flow but the effectiveness of that money is being achieved.
Mr Turner: The OECD reported in
2004 that 50% of aid financing for water and sanitation went to
large infrastructure projects in urban areas in middle income
countries. The issue about targeting is absolutely critical. It
is the case that there is insufficient funding going into the
sector, and at least doubling is the sort of figure that has been
required, but how is that funding directed? From a WaterAid perspective
it is very much about the Global Plan of Action that is a part
of the political catalytic process and then coming down to national
frameworks where governments themselves are putting in place the
needs they have identified, financing them and then resourcing
that from domestic sources. I think the Human Development Report
suggested that 1% of GDP should be allocated to water and sanitation,
and currently it is about half that. When those plans are in place
aid should be targeted to support those countries that have got
to that stage; so that aid is directed to those countries that
are actually going through this national process. Within countries
we have not really spent much time talking about the people, the
organisations, who deliver services—the municipality and
the local authority in rural areas. How does the support to the
national process actually come down to the delivery mechanisms?
We think a lot more focus should be paid to the capacity that
is needed there so that those authorities can plan more holistically,
plan their water supply and sanitation at the same time as planning
their health and education, and integrating and being more holistic
in the delivery of services. Just to give one very specific example
and it refers to a question that was asked about the lack of data:
WaterAid, and now supported by DFID, has done a water point mapping
exercise in Malawi. It is a tool now that the Government of Malawi
have adopted. We discovered that Malawi could achieve its Millennium
Development Goal with existing financing if it was more equitable
in the way that that funding was allocated. On current trends
they will miss their target by 10 years if they do not change
the process of who gets access to the water point. This process
captured imagination; it became a tool for the local district
authorities; it became a tool for communities who were not being
given access to new water points; it is now a tool that the national
government will use as part of prioritising where donor funding
is going to go. It is a relatively simple tool and can serve a
number of different purposes. Until thought about who is getting
access to those resources is brought to bear we will not be putting
money in the right place. Yes, more money, but targeted money.
Q95 Richard Burden: I have just got
a couple of questions, if I may, to Mr Garcia Fragio, first of
all, basically about the EU Water Initiative. It was launched,
in a sense, in a blaze of glory in 2002 at the World Summit but
it has come in for quite a lot of criticism since then. The trends
in terms of EU aid show water actually is receiving a declining
share there. There have been suggestions that some Member States
handle this sensitively and perhaps give more priority to this
area than others. Do you think those criticisms are fair and,
if so, how do you think the Initiative can be better reformed?
Mr García Fragío:
I think as in life the glasses are half empty or half full, and
it depends on how you look at them; you can see they are half
empty or half full. Those who are optimistic think although it
has not been perfect, and there are many things which should have
been done in a different way, they believe it can still be reformed
and made more efficient and more in line with the objectives.
The first thing I would like to say is that the Water Initiative
was never intended to be a new financing tool or instrument. It
was created as an instrument to coordinate EU donors, to enhance
dialogue with African countries and to try to bring up those areas
within the water context that have to some extent been neglected
in policy. It was a policy formed together with African partners—at
a continental level with the African Conference on Water, at a
national level with the governments as well—to try to align
programmes and methods of Member States within that framework.
It was not a new financial instrument. I think the expectations
that this new Initiative would bring immediately a new funding
to the sector is probably the first criticism which has to be
acknowledged; but which has to be seen in the context of the Initiative
itself. If the Initiative has not worked—and I have read
some reports from some NGOs which bring up a number of correct
criticisms—I think that has been the fault of one side,
probably of the Commission of not having put enough effort and
strength to it, but also the Member States, and I want to say
that very clearly. Why do I say the Member States? Because it
was the joint effort where there was need for solidarity and roles
to be shared. For example, some concepts that we tried to develop
were the concepts of the country leadership. We thought certain
Member States who were more active in country X or country Y would
take the leadership of the sector and lead the dialogue with a
country and would push the Initiative globally but that has happened
to a very limited extent. The criticism of the Initiative on the
lack of results can be accepted, but I think we have to see the
whys. I will tell you afterwards what we are trying to do. On
the whys, I think there is a need for streamlining the multiplicity
of groups that have grown up. There have been a lot of interested
partners coming in and there are regional groups. There is one
group dealing with Africa; one with Latin America; and one with
Eastern Europe. In addition to that there are horizontal groups:
the finance working group; the monitoring group etc. So I think
there is a need to try to streamline that structure, to make it
more operational. There is a need to convince Member States that
there is an added value in working through the European Water
Initiative, and that is an effort we are trying to do for some
time with limited success, but with success as well. Finally,
there is a need to concentrate, if we want to deliver, on what
the Water Initiative can do, which is improve the coherence of
the country dialogues. If we get all the EU partners, and it is
very correct that the EU as a whole is the largest donor in the
water sector, if we get the larger donors together talking to
the countries and making sure that the strategies of the country
are agreed by the major players and there is support and not duplication
of efforts, but alignment of the basic objectives and share of
responsibilities, I think that is the point—improving the
country dialogues, improving the programming and—why not—raising
the profile of water but as a sort of motivator or facilitator.
I do not think the Water Initiative per se can bring more
funds; I think the Water Initiative should push the players to
increase funding and better targeting, but I think we should keep
that in mind. What are we doing? We are trying to move from the
present situation. There was a meeting last May obviously in committee
of the Water Initiative. There is a review which has been launched
by DFID. Germany, which is in the lead for this six months and
will take the EU Presidency in the next semester, is committed
to move in that reform process, as I have said, to try to make
it more operational or less bureaucratic, if you want to use that
term, and more targeted towards policy and country dialogue. We
have that, and if we convince Member States to accompany us in
that process I think the Water Initiative can take another shape
probably by March or so of next year. One thing is the Water Initiative
and another thing is the Water Facility where there are also criticisms,
but the question you raised was on the Initiative.
Chairman: We will come to that.
Q96 Richard Burden: You talked about
DFID's involvement and the review that it is undertaking. We heard
this morning from some DFID officials about some of their approaches
and thoughts on the EU Water Initiative. From the Commission's
point of view what do you feel that the UK could do to improve
the credibility of the EU Water Initiative? In other words, what
should that review come up with, and what could we do to promote
better engagement from other Member States?
Mr García Fragío:
First of all, I would like to say that the UK is probably one
of the Member States which has been more heavily involved in this
process, together with Germany, Denmark and France. The UK has
seconded already a national expert to reinforce and work at the
secretariat and that is a major contribution, and that person
is going to stay with us until the spring of 2008. Certainly through
that national expert, but also through the policy discussions
that we have with DFID, there may be an opportunity for influencing
and trying to get some of the policy thinking that they want enshrined
into the new version of the Water Initiative. DFID is also very
active in a number of countries in Africa. I think that is another
area where DFID can take the leadership in that sector and contribute
to the improvement of the Water Initiative and country dialogues.
I think the main thing where DFID could be of help is in the completion
of this report, taking stock of what has worked and what has not
worked and developing a dialogue with those Member States which
are somewhat reluctant to engage fully into the process. The Member
States are basically two groups: those where, because of their
bilateral cooperation, water plays a central role—and there
you have Germany; you have the UK on the policy side; you have
Holland, Denmark, Sweden and Austria; and France mainly interested
in the river basin management and water resources management.
I think engaging in that dialogue with those Member States who
are not so active—because basically of the old 15 (because
the newcomers are really not even coming to many of the discussions)
about half are really active and the other half are not—DFID
can be very instrumental (because it has a presence in Africa
that others do not have) to try to bring them together. That is
point one. Point two is I think DFID has another strength with
respect to other donors because of the links DFID has with the
World Bank, on what would be the financing tools or the additional
financial mechanisms which may be developed to try to attract
private sector funding. Most of the European ODA[14]
agencies concentrate on public funding support and do very little
thinking about how you can add private sector or other financial
flows to complement what is being done by the ODA alone. DFID
has been leading a working group, which has been a financial working
group, bringing the results of the group into the heart of the
African regional group; and this is probably another horizontal
or cross-cutting contribution of DFID that could be made to this
process. First, policy; second, presence at country level; and,
third, a push which DFID has developed jointly with those Member
States interested to try to bring them into reality. I believe
we are talking about money; we are talking about financial flows;
we are talking about an increase of the ODA but I do not think
we can do it alone with the ODA; I think there is a need for others
to come in, and that is something we have not been able to do—neither
the World Bank, nor ourselves, nor the bilaterals. The private
sector is not interested in Africa.
Richard Burden: One further question.
I accept fully your opening comment that the Initiative is a political
initiative and not principally a financial one, and that you emphasise
that there does need to be a sharp focus on where the financing
is targeted, but it is fairly stark, is it not? The statistics
we have got is that less than 30% of EU Water Initiative funding
goes to Africa, and if there is going to be a real impact in terms
of the MDGs that is well off the beam, is it not? Is there anything
that is going on now, if that is understood and accepted, even
amongst those Member States that are probably not so engaged at
the moment, that there is something wrong with that balance, and
there is some urgency to change that?
Q97 James Duddridge: We are going
out to Ethiopia in February, one of the 10 pilot countries for
the EU Water Initiative. Is it possible to ask you for an update
on how we are doing in Ethiopia with regards to the Water Initiative
specifically in relation to the key aims of improving coordination,
increasing funding and strengthening governance?
Mr García Fragío:
The general question first. On the ratio of funds going to one
region and another, you have mentioned that it is only 30% of
the total Water Initiative, what I would like to say there is
that 30% of the total aid to the water sector is not exactly the
same—in the sense that the other countries, the middle income
countries, Latin America etc., are getting aid through the Commission
budget and the Water Initiative is merely driven through the EDF,
the African component. That has to be put into perspective. However,
the basic element is correct. It is true that water is not having
enough attention within the African countries. It is not having
the attention it deserves, this is true. That happens at EC level
and with certain Member States. I think in terms of if we are
conscious or not that a change has to be made from the Commission,
we are. This is probably the reason why there was a first attempt
made with the Water Facility to try to stimulate the sector with
€250 million, and it was followed with another tranche of
another €250 million. The total allocation over the last
two years has been €500 million. We are confronted with a
situation, and there is an internal debate and (I did not say
it before) I think here is also a point where Member States can
be very useful. We are now programming the next EDF, and the figure
has been mentioned here of a substantial increase in funding.
From the statistics we are getting there seems to be a slight
increase but not a major quantum leap forward, big step forward,
of countries which are willing to put water as a priority. We
will have to discuss with Member States during 2007 the country
programmes which are being negotiated with the countries; and
there will be a decision to be taken there on whether, in addition
to what we do through the channels, cooperation at a national
level, we need an extension or a new reformulated Water Facility
with a different mechanism to support that effort and bring this
attention to water. I think this is the debate which will be coming
up in the next months, and in that debate I think that the voice
of the Member States is essential. At the end of the day the money
we are using is EU Member States' contributions, so it is not
us; we are just managing it and making use of the funds that are
allocated.
Q98 Chairman: Is it part of the general
problem of EU priorities that the UK in particular has got a high
priority towards Africa and other Member States do not?
Mr García Fragío:
Yes.
Q99 Chairman: The Ethiopia question?
Mr García Fragío:
Ethiopia, what has been achieved so far and what is the process,
first of all: the country dialogue was launched in November 2005.
There has been in work progress since then, and there is agreement
to establish a biannual review process, particularly with respect
to what has been achieved in terms of MDGs progress. There is
a whole working group or multi-stakeholder structure which has
been discussing the national plan, and there have been the four-sector
ministries—the ministry for agriculture, water resources,
health and education; those that are involved in water issues;
the main donors, not only the EU but other donors; and civil society
projects. The conditions have been set up to have an agreed national
plan of action at country level. There are a number of projects
which have already been decided to be put forward. I have a list
here if you want to know what has been agreed. There has been
an analysis of the shortcomings.
13 African, Caribbean and Pacific. Back
14
Official Development Assistance. Back
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