$13m Grant for Water

THE Netherlands government, together with the World Bank, has provided a $13 million grant to the government of Ghana to support the implementation of the urban water project.
The project will provide potable water for more than 600,000 people in the urban areas by the end of 2010.
The Minister for Water Resources, Works and Housing, Alhaji Boniface Abubakar Sidique, at a signing agreement in Accra last Thursday, said the Netherlands had been a long-standing partner of the government of Ghana in the provision of safe and potable water for urban and rural areas.
He said the government recognised the contribution of good drinking water to the health and well-being of Ghanaians.
“In this light, the government of Ghana has identified a clear linkage between poverty and access to drinking water and sanitation,” he noted, and emphasised that improving access to potable water and sanitation was critical to achieving favourable health outcomes.
That, he said, would, in turn, facilitate economic growth and sustained poverty reduction as outlined in the Growth and Poverty Reduction Strategy II (GPRS II) document.
He expressed gratitude to the Netherlands government for the support and promised that the funds would be used judiciously.
The Dutch Ambassador, Ms Lidi Remmelzwaal, said improving access to safe drinking water would not be possible without mobilising new investments in urban water systems and the extension of distribution networks, especially for low-income consumers.
She stated that development partners were supporting the Ghana government to achieve those goals, together with the World Bank and the GWCL.
The World Bank Country Manager for Ghana, Ms Katherine Bain, said the project would benefit mostly low-income people, in line with the GPRS II and consistent with the mission of the World Bank.
She said the project was also supporting some pilot studies being conducted by the Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC) aimed at improving services in poor communities in the Accra metropolitan area, adding that if the results of those pilot studies were successful, they would then be applied country-wide.