Developing Water Governance Capacities

Abstract

"In many places of the world, a staggering 30 to 40% or more of the water in pipes and canals goes unaccounted due to leakages and illegal tapping. The Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) has estimated that the overall water-use efficiency for irrigated agriculture in developing countries averages 38%. The Indian-based Centre for Sustainable Development recently provided figures for Bangalore showing that the upper middle and middle classes receive on average over 200 litres of water per capita per day (lpcd), while slums only receive some 66 lpcd on average. Other figures suggest that slum dwellers in other Asian cities sometimes get as little as 5-10 lpcd. Similar trends of mismanagement and unequal water distribution have also been noted for irrigated agriculture, where small-scale farmers get relatively less water than the more powerful large-scale farmers."