DWASA and Its Role in Public Life

DWASA Act. 1996. NRW must be reduced to 6 months equivalent of billing from the present level of 13 months. This will be achieved through the participation of the private sector, CBOs and NGOs. Collection efficiency will be increased to over 90% and arrear for electricity shall be eliminated. An operating ratio of not more than 0.7 shall be maintained. All domestic and non-domestic connections will be metered and payment shall be made on the basis of metered consumption.

The Government will establish a regulatory body to encourage private sector participation and investment, ensure affordable and sustainable service provision, improve performance and cost effectiveness of service providers (both Private sector and Government) help set rational tariff, and strengthen the overall transparency and accountability of DWASA. Resource Mobilization In order to generate adequate funds to meet the cost of building water supply, sewerage and storm water drainage infrastructure in the housing areas, the respective Private /PLiblic organization(s) will build- in the cost of providing water supply, sewerage and storm water drainage services with the cost of the housing plots.

Amount of water sold for industrial/commercial use will require thorough investigation and consideration needs to be given to charging for any water abstracted from ground-water through own private tube wells.

An amnesty will be called in regularizing unauthorized connections.Any unauthorized connections found thereafter will be penalized.

Management DWASA will have an organogram approved with right-sizing of staff by June 2008 and approved staffing positions filled with qualified staff by the end of 2008 The capacity building of DWASA will be completed within the year 2008.

NRW will be measured by production metering. Illegal connections will be addressed through declaration of an amnesty and house to house surveys by mid 2006. NRW will be targeted to be less than 30%.

DWASA will conduct awareness raising programs about water supply and sanitation for one week each year.7.10.4 DWASA will gradually introduce Water Safety Plan as recommended by World Health Organization in the Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality (Annexure-B) for consistently ensuring the safety of a water supply. In this respect, DWASA will start assessment of the system. effective operational monitoring and development of management plans for appropriate actions including system upgrading and improvement Adopting Zonal Approach for Overall Service Improvement Zonal approach can be successfully adopted for overall improvement of water supply, sewerage and storm water drainage services. In zonal approach, a relatively small area shall be hydraulically isolated to form a Water District� where adequate water supply of acceptable quality is ensured for 100% of the population for 24 hours and almost 100% collection of DWASA revenue can also be ensured with civil society involvement.

DWASA with the assistance of ADB has already started pilot testing of zonal approach in Manikdi area. Based on the lessons learned from the pilot project, DWASA will improve water services in all other zones of Dhaka WASA wherever suitable, using the zonal approach.

Policy and Legal Framework