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FOREWORD As President of UCLG, I warmly welcome the publication of the Third Global Report on Local Democracy and Decentralization (GOLD III). This report on basic local service provision fulfils UCLG’s commitment to present a review of the state of local democracy and decentralization across the world every three years. As a member of the SecretaryGeneral’s High-Level Panel of Eminent Persons on the Post-2015 Development Agenda, I am certain that GOLD III will make a unique contribution to international debates on the Millennium Development Goals, the Post-2015 Development Agenda, and the Habitat III Global Urban Agenda. Basic services are essential, not only for the preservation of human life and dignity, but also in driving economic growth and ensuring social equality. ‘Putting people first’ therefore implies putting basic services first. In this light, GOLD III should be taken as a call to action. The report makes clear that, while there has been progress in service access and quality, huge gaps in provision remain and access rates are even falling in some cities in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. In addition to existing access deficits, rapid urbanization and demographic and environmental changes are posing radical new challenges that make significant increases in investment in basic service infrastructure necessary. The global urban population will grow by around 1.4 billion people over the next 20-30 years. These new urban residents will need access to drinking water, sanitation, housing, waste collection, transport, and electricity. There are already nearly a billion slum-dwellers who have limited or no access to many basic services. A failure to address the urban access issue will have serious repercussions for human wellbeing, environmental sustainability, and economic development. GOLD III serves as a warning, but, at the same time, it offers a way forward. Local governments, as the level of government closest to the people, are particularly wellplaced to guarantee universal access to quality basic services. This report demonstrates that improvements to basic services are positively correlated with local government involvement in their provision. Local governments are willing and able to rise to the challenge of providing basic services, but they need the human, technical and, above all, the financial resources to do so. GOLD III highlights the common challenges that local governments across the world face in balancing the financial sustainability of services with affordability for their residents, particularly the urban poor. Strengthening the capacity of local governments is essential to reducing access deficits. GOLD III showcases examples of where decentralized management, improved efficiency, along with a better mobilization of local resources and a more targeted use of subsidies, have contributed to expanding access in a sustainable way.