Transparency vital to keeping water sector free of corruption

“The World Water Forum provides a powerful platform to highlight the importance of tackling corruption in all areas of the water sector and the role that a multi-stakeholder coalition can play in initiating and supporting pro-poor actions to combat corruption”, said Dr. Donal O'Leary, coordinator of TI's activities in the water sector, who will be presenting the initiative.

The pervasiveness and durability of corruption in the water sector necessitates an anti-corruption coalition to raise awareness and facilitate effective actions on the ground, from influencing national policy through to community-level initiatives. The urgency of this challenge is echoed in the recently issued United Nations report on water, which cites corruption as the primary reason why clean drinking water remains unobtainable for 1.1 billion people.

“The management of the world's water must be as transparent as this precious natural resource in order to meet the Millennium Development Goal of halving the number of people without access to drinking water by 2015”, said Huguette Labelle, Chair of Transparency International. “Aid money for water sector development, which has the potential to save 4,000 lives each day, must be used effectively. Otherwise, we'll be dipping into dry and dirty wells while hoping to avert illness, dehydration and lost crops”, said Ms. Labelle.

The presentation entitled, “The Water Integrity Network (WIN): An Initiative to Combat Corruption in the Water Sector”, addresses how to establish an anti-corruption coalition for the water resources and service management sector, an area in which TI has already made advances through its national chapters in Colombia and Argentina.

TI national chapter Transparencia por Colombia designed a pioneering methodology based on TI's Business Principles for Countering Bribery to demonstrate that bribery does not have to be an inherent part of doing business. In April 2005, 11 leading national and international companies in Colombia's water sector signed an anti-bribery agreement. Similarly, in December 2005, nine pre-eminent firms from Argentina's water infrastructure sector committed to a no-bribery policy.

Alma Rocío Balcazar, private sector coordinator of Transparencia por Colombia, will also present that chapter's initiative as part of the World Water Forum meeting entitled “How to Overcome Corruption in Water Resources and Services Management”, convened by the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI), Swedish Water House (SWH), Asociación Interamericana de Ingenieria Sanitaria y Ambiental (AIDIS) and International Initiatives on Corruption and Governance (IICG).