I refer to the replies to Question No. 408 on 14 March 2003 and Question No. 579 on 25 March 2003.
Making arrangements for the provision of water services in Africa or any country is primarily a matter for the Government of the country involved. The initiative "Water for Life" is being developed by the European Union in partnership with Africa and other participating countries with a view to meeting the goal established at the World Summit on Sustainable Development of halving by 2015 the proportion of the world population without access to safe drinking water and sanitation. The initiative is intended to mobilise the necessary technical and financial resources, public and private, to provide water services in areas where such services are required and which are unlikely to be provided without the support of the international community. The initiative will be demand-led by the partner developing countries.
The ministerial declaration adopted at the recent World Water Forum endorses the need to explore the full range of financing arrangements, including private sector participation, and to mobilise all sources of financing, both public and private, national and international, to meet these goals; create an environment conducive to facilitating such investment; raise funds by adopting cost-recovery approaches which suit local climatic, social and environmental conditions with due consideration for the poor; and identify and develop new mechanisms of public private partnerships while ensuring the necessary public control and legal frameworks to protect the public interest with a particular emphasis on protecting the interests of the poor.
