October, 2000
Rural Water Supply Project To Bring Clean Water, Sanitation Services To 2,500 Community Groups In India

Contact Person:
In Delhi: Geetanjali Chopra 91 11 461-7241
In Washington: Ricardo Castro (202) 458-5157
rcastro3@worldbank.org

NEW DELHI, November 8, 2000-The Indian State Government of Kerala will increase access to clean water and sanitation services for poor rural communities through a US$65.5 million World Bank credit for the Kerala Rural Water Supply and Environmental Sanitation Project, which has been approved by the Bank's board.

Despite increased national and state commitment to improve water supply, service delivery remains limited-especially in poor and more remote areas-due to a lack of community involvement and decision-making responsibility. As a result, many existing water supply schemes do not meet the needs of users who spend several hours each day collecting water.

"Clean water needs clear policies," said Ghanasham Abhyankar, senior sanitary engineer and task leader for the project. "Such policies require treating water as an economic and social good, managed at the lowest appropriate level. Thus, to make the rural water supply and sanitation service delivery sustainable, it is essential that the community groups have a decisive role in the process of selecting, financing, implementing and managing systems that meet their demands and willingness to pay."

The project will improve water and sanitation services for 1.5 million people, specifically targeting Kerala's poorer and disadvantaged communities in the Kozhikode, Malappuram, Palakkad and Thrissur districts. The project will assist local and state public agencies in shifting focus from direct service delivery to supporting community groups in planning, constructing and operating piped water supply and environmental sanitation systems. It will also assist the Government of Kerala and the Government of India in building their capacity to implement India's sector reform policies.

To ensure sustained commitment to the schemes, communities will finance part of the capital costs and all of the operation and maintenance costs. Through empowerment of local villages and provision of infrastructure, these communities will have a greater voice in determining how the water and sanitation schemes are designed and where they are located. This pilot project is aimed at demonstrating the viability of the new decentralized service delivery model as well as to assist the state government in moving towards its statewide application.

The project will finance construction or improvement of small scale piped water supply schemes in some 2500 community groups. The emphasis will be on using traditional local water sources. The project will also promote and support ground water recharge programs to improve the sustainability of supply from the selected drinking water sources. The environmental sanitation schemes will finance construction of over 45,000 household sanitary latrines and small-scale drainage schemes. Capacity building of all the stakeholders and particularly of the community groups in technical, financial and management aspects is an important element of the project design.

The project specifically seeks to encourage participation of women and socially disadvantaged groups, who have had severe constraints with access to drinking water and latrines. In addition, women will also have access to income-generating opportunities under the project. A special tribal development program will improve the quality of life of tribal population in select tribal clusters in the project districts through improved water and sanitation infrastructure and capacity building.

The US$65.5 million equivalent interest-free credit is provided by the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank's concessionary lending affiliate and has 35 years to maturity and a 10-year grace period. Total project costs are US$89.8 million. The remaining funding will be contributed by the Government of Kerala (US$6.8 million), local governments (US$6.8 million), and local communities (US$10.8 million.).
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For more information on this or other South Asia Projects, please visit: http://www.worldbank.org/sarprojects