Environmental Science & Engineering - www.esemag.com - January 2004
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Asian Water Supplies - Reaching the Urban Poor
Arthur McIntosh’s book gives exhaustive coverage
on providing drinking water to Third World countries
and a surprising perspective on the economics
of providing potable water to the poor.
It highlights some myths, misconceptions
and realities of providing and delivering
water supplies through a wide
range of scenarios. The findings are
amazing. In Manila, for example, a household
helper pays 900 pesos per month for
vended water, while her employer pays 200
pesos a month for piped water.
In five areas of Kathmandu, which have
a combined population of 1.1 million, an
estimated 52 percent of households have
individual connections to piped supplies, with
some 30 percent getting water from public
taps. The remaining 18 percent must obtain
water from wells, stone spouts, springs and
streams. Barely two percent of people receive a
full day’s supply during the rainy season and
almost no one receives 24 hour piped water during the dry
season. Those reliant on standpipes often have to get up in
the middle of the night to wait for water which they do
eventually receive without charge. In the case of sanitation,
22 percent of households are connected to a sewage system;
70 percent rely on septic tanks. Private operators usually
do the desludging of septic systems. There are four
wastewater treatment plants with a combined treatment
capacity of 40,000 m3 a day.
Despite this, untreated sewage has badly polluted some
water bodies. The author suggests that water scarcity is
Kathmandu’s perennial crisis, with some people regarding
themselves lucky if they get water every two or three days.
Many other areas suffer badly, like
Kathmandu, in the provision of safe, affordable
water supplies but Singapore is at the other
end of the spectrum. The author suggests that
the Singapore Public Utilities Board is perhaps
the best water utility in the world and
pays some of its staff members more than
$150,000 per year. This compares to the
average $5,000 a year paid to many other
Asian water managers.
Singapore has reduced non-revenue
water (NRW) to less than 10 percent of
production. The author suggests that
many systems with NRW above 40 percent
have numerous visible leaks in
service connections, thousands of which
are illegal connections. This book is
filled with data about Asian water services,
presented and illustrated in a highly readable format. The
provision of safe drinking water remains the biggest challenge
facing environmental engineers today.
Asian Water Supplies - Reaching the Urban Poor
By Arthur C. McIntosh
IWA Publishing, October 2003,
ISBN: 1843390434
Paperback, glossy cover
Price: US $80
Website: www.iwapublishing.com
Review by Tom Davey, Editor
See our home page on how to order your subscription. We regret we can
only accept orders from Canada and the United States.
