950803

Investors being wooed

to expand Karachi's

water sector

KARACHI: The Managing Director, Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB), Brig. Mansoor Ahmed, said here on Thursday that both the Sindh government and the KWSB intend to continue dialogue with the private sector and to build more confidence among investors so that large private capital may be mobilized towards Karachi's water sector under terms favourable to the Government.

Addressing a press conference at the KWSB's Development Wing here on Thursday, Brig Mansoor, referred to the visit of the Chief Minister and senior officials of the Sindh government and the KWSB, including himself, to France recently where, he said, discussions were held with international water sector operators and investment banks in Paris with an objective of initiating a dialogue to promote investments in Karachi's water supply and sewerage sector.

The Government was there not to sell the KWSB to foreigners, but to trigger an early interest among the international investors' community to attract foreign investment flows into Karachi's water and sewerage sector, which was plagued with chronic under-investment, the KWSB M.D. emphasised.

He said the meetings with the prospective private-sector partners in development, which were part of week-long World Bank-organised workshop, focused on promoting the role of the private sector in the provision and augmentation of water and sewerage services in Karachi.

Brig. Mansoor pointed out that current water supply and distribution situation in Karachi had not only caused widespread dissatisfaction among the general public, but was also hindering the economic and industrial growth of the city.

He informed that the current supply gap was about 252 million gallons per day, or over 40 percent of the estimated demand of water.

Brig. Mansoor observed that planned capacity additions will not be able to reduce the supply shortage significantly. He said a significant share of Pakistan's rapid growth was attributable to Karachi, which contributes more than 20 percent of the country's GDP and 42 percent of value-added goods in large scale manufacturing. The state of water supply was retarding the economic growth of the city, and was expected to worsen over the next few years if major reforms were not initiated now, he added.

"The bulk water supply was just one part of the problem", the KWSB chief said adding that a significant share of the water that is produced, perhaps in the order of 40 percent to 50 percent of production, was not accounted for.

He said two major reasons for this phenomenon were: (i) the distribution network of Karachi was so old and neglected that there were heavy water losses due to system leakage; and (ii) there was considerable amount of unlawful consumption of water.

Due to this, the citizens of Karachi were getting only about half of the water that was being produced, and the KWSB was only realising a fraction of the revenues that were due, he added.

Brig. Mansoor said Karachi had an urgent need to (i) increase water supply to the city, at least in line with the consumption growth projection based on population increase and economic growth; (ii) arrest water losses through extensive repair and rehabilitation of the existing distribution network and transmission lines, and through aggressive management practices to reduce illegal water consumption and (iii) extend the water supply network so that more and more city residents have access to potable water.

Additionally, there was a need to rehabilitate and expand the sewerage network as over 70 percent of the water consumed was ultimately discharged as sewage.-APP