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The African Development Bank on Monday announced its approval of a loan of some US $46.77 million from its African Development Fund as well as a grant of $1.66 million from its Technical Assistance Fund to the government of Tanzania to finance a water supply and sanitation project in the capital city, Dar es Salaam.
The five-year project is intended to improve the accessibility, quality, reliability and affordability of water supply and sanitation services to the population of Dar es Salaam.
Due to get underway in September 2002, it will involve the rehabilitation and extension of water supply and waste water facilities, as well as the implementation of a community water supply and sanitation programme, according to the bank. See http://www.afdb.org
It will also contribute to strengthening the institutions tasked with supplying water and sanitation services in the Tanzanian capital, notably the Dar es Salaam Water Supply and Sewerage Authority, and promoting partnership between the public and private sectors in managing water supply and sanitation projects.
Rapid urbanisation in Eastern Africa - and the most recent census figures show that urban concentration is a growing trend - has not been accompanied by a rise in economic development, and there has been an overall decline in the quality and quantity of service provision, according to the UN Centre for Human Settlements (UNCHS) in Nairobi, Kenya.
The process of urban growth in East Africa, including Dar es Salaam, has come to be associated with unemployment, low levels of life expectancy, poor nutrition status, and low levels of education, according to the agency.
Low-income households, which constitute more than 70 percent of urban households in the region, have no adequate access to clean running water, adequate shelter and other municipal amenities such as roads, garbage collection, sanitation and so on, and are therefore exposed to all kinds of disease, Habitat adds. See http://www.unchs.org/unchs/planning/privat/contents.htm
Statistics indicate that 23 percent of the urban population in developing countries has no potable water within 200m, and this rises to 35% in sub-Saharan Africa, including Eastern Africa.
About 70 percent of the urban population of six million has some kind of access to piped water, according to the International Development Association (IDA) - the soft lending arm of the World Bank - which is also funding the Dar es Salaam project.
However, the Urban Water and Sewerage Authorities (UWSAs), which took over urban water systems from central government in early 1997, still provide unreliable services and the water delivered is rarely safe for drinking, the IDA stated. Water tariffs cover at best staff, energy and chemicals; maintenance is rarely funded, and commercial and financial performances are poor.
Settlements in Dar es Salaam have been characterised by lack of basic community infrastructure services, including water supply, sewerage, access roads, drainage and solid-waste management, according to a paper presented by the government of Tanzania at the UN General Assembly’s 'Istanbul plus 5' special session on human shelter in June.
Between 40 and 70 percent of the urban residents currently live in informal settlements [many of them slums], it said.
Less than 10 percent of the urban population is connected to a sewerage system and another 10 percent (mostly in the middle and upper income group) use septic tanks, leaving the rest of the population dependent on pit latrines, according to the IDA.
Sanitation services are still in the hands of the various municipal councils but are to be handed over to the UWSAs. However, due to poor maintenance over the last decades, most of the sewerage and waste water treatment infrastructure is not functioning.
"Pit emptying services are often inadequate, and most latrine users resort to manual emptying with heavy associated health risks. Cholera outbreaks are common," the IDA added.
The rationale for the Dar es Salaam project, then, to improve public health and well being in a city prone to cholera and outbreaks of water-borne diseases, and to support activities of the country's capital and main economic centre, by helping establish a reliable, sustainable and affordable water and sanitation service.
Among the environmental issues that have been identified are the need to assure the proper disposal of sludge from waste water stabilisation ponds which are to be rehabilitated; the proper collection of additional waste water generated in areas where piped water would be provided; and disruption created by construction activities.
The project is being financed by the IDA, the European Investment Bank (EIB), and the Agence Francaise de Developpement (AFD), as well as the ADF/TAF.
This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions