"While we often assume that the benefits of improving water and sanitation systems always outweigh the costs, this is not always true", say Dale Whittington and Bjørn Lomborg. New research [1] written for the 2008 Copenhagen Consensus reveals that the full cost of piping water to a household is as high as US$ 80 (EUR 51.50) per month, which is far beyond the means of most families in developing countries. Whittington and Lomborg claim that “the health advantages of providing networked water supplies are less dramatic than is often assumed”. They also challenge the assumption that all dams are bad investments, especially in the case of multi-purpose dams for power, irrigation and flood protection.

The research found that three alternatives to expensive network infrastructure systems - boreholes with hand pumps, bio-sand filters and community-led total sanitation (CLTS) – delivered benefits that were 2-3 times higher than the investments.

Sanitation and water is one the ten challenges that are being addressed by the 2008 Copenhagen Consensus. More than 55 international economists, including 5 Nobel Laureates, will be invited to assess proposed solutions for the challenges and assemble a list of priorities. The first Copenhagen Consensus was held in 2004.

[1] Whttington, D. ... [et al.]. (2008). Copenhagen Consensus 2008 challenge paper sanitation and water. Frederiksberg, Denmark, Copenhagen Consensus Center. Comments, in the form of two perspective papers, are provided by Jenna Davis of Stanford University, and Frank Rijsberman / Alix Peterson Zwane of Water and Sanitation Services at Google.org. Download the papers here

Related news: Cost-benefit: water and sanitation investment highly cost-effective, say top economists, Source Weekly, 02 Jun 2004

Contact: Dale Whittington, Dept. of Environmental Sciences & Engineering and City & Regional Planning, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA, and Manchester Business School, Manchester University, UK, Dale_Whittington@unc.edu ; Henrik Meyer, Deputy Director, Copenhagen Consensus Center, Denmark, hm.ccc@cbs.dk

Web site: Copenhagen Consensus

Source: Dale Whittington and Bjørn Lomborg, Project Syndicate, May 2008

Tags: financing, on-site sanitation, water collection, water distribution, water treatment