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The objective of this article is to propose a panel of management performance evaluation indicators at operator level. This panel would be the tool to be made available to an observatory that should be set up by regulation. The proposal comes at the right time given that Morocco is planning a major reform of the sector very soon. A framework law has already been promulgated for this purpose (Law 51-21 relating to the reform of public establishments).

The proposed panel is the result of (1) a review of the literature dealing with public management theories, in particular those relating to industrial and commercial public services and whose character is captive. The management of the latter requires a great deal of caution to preserve their economic balance and consequently their sustainability. (2) A review of experiences of countries is chosen because of contextual their similarities with Morocco like France having a similar legal background, Tunisia and Algeria chosen for geographical and economic similarities. The British experience is also discussed for what it represents as a liberal model in the management of public water and sanitation services, as opposed to the German model also studied and which stands as the only country where the management of public services has almost always been a communal prerogative. The analysis of these models has made it possible to identify management evaluation practices that could be adapted to the Moroccan context. (3) Research work by practitioners and reports from specialized international institutions (International Water Association [IWA]). (4) A critical analysis of a multitude of management and activity reports from 12 autonomous authorities and 4 private delegates covering 16 million inhabitants of the urban environment. A total of 15 indicators are developed. They aim to assess the effectiveness of management in terms of saving drinking water and preserving the natural environment from the pollution of water resources.

Approximately, 15 indicators for assessing water resource management in public water and sanitation services are proposed. These indicators relate to the efficiency of pipe networks, the performance of storage systems and losses in users' homes. Indicators specific to liquid sanitation systems, particularly with regard to the control of wastewater overflows into the public highway and their treatment before discharge into the natural environment, are also proposed.

The application of the results of this research could be confronted with its appropriation by the operators. Indeed, the investment involved in setting up the proposed evaluation system, as well as the conflict of interest that may arise in the process of formalizing and standardizing the system at the national level, may slow down the process of setting it up.

In practice, the implementation of a system for evaluating the performance of water resource management in public drinking water and liquid sanitation services would make it possible to optimize the volume of water to be mobilized. Substantial savings are expected both at the level of the resource itself and at the level of the investments that accompany the realization of the mobilization and distribution infrastructures. These savings will be very useful for the creation of other similar services and to serve more people.

The distribution of drinking water and liquid sanitation is a vital human need. These services are extremely captive. They are key factors in the socioeconomic development of the territory and the citizen. The impact is transversal and affects the lifestyle of the populations. On the one hand, it favors the sedentarization of the populations and on the other hand, preserves their health by fighting against the diseases of water origin. In addition, the comfort that it provides in the daily life of users is highly coveted when they are delivered in a modern way and arranged with modern technologies.

The regulation of public drinking water and liquid sanitation services in Morocco is the weakest link in the sector. The Ministry of the Interior is legally responsible for setting up a standard system for evaluating the management of these services to fill this gap (organic law 113-14 on municipalities). Unfortunately, this initiative is not yet underway. The opportunity to apply the results of this research is well timed. Morocco plans to launch a global reform of the sector starting in 2022–2023 (Law 50-21 on the reform of public institutions).

The purpose of this paper is to use relevant models and theories to conceptualize the prospects and challenges associated with private sector involvement in the provision of sanitation and environmental services in urban settlements of developing African economies.

The study adopts the public choice theory and principal-agent model in its conceptualization and analysis. Retrospective literature analysis within the qualitative research approach has been employed for the study. It draws extensively on existing classical theoretical and current empirical literature on privatization of urban sanitation services in developing countries.

The study observes that privatization is a necessary tool for enhancing quality and responsive sanitation service delivery but there must be some mechanisms to prevent any latent challenges. The study also observes that the same problems associated with the public sector could transcend into the private sector if key measures are not taken into consideration.

The process of privatizing or contracting out must ensure competition, enough communication to all stakeholders as well as involving expertise in the bidding process. The process also requires strict monitoring and supervision; these call for an appropriate legal framework to regulate privatization. The paper reminds urban administrators and policy makers to be circumspect in the privatization process. If the process of privatization is carried out effectively, urban sanitation services will be provided effectively and efficiently.

The paper adapts the public choice and principal-agent model to assess privatization processes in developing African countries. This study will be of importance to urban administrators, public officials and policy makers in general.

The study attempts to look into the poverty and deprivation in slums across various social and religious groups and its bearing on the children. It not only analyses income poverty but also looks at derivation of access to basic services including water, sanitation and drainage. The purpose of this paper is to compare and contrast the income and non-income deprivation of childbearing and non-childbearing households.

The study is based on a survey of 541 sample households selected from 23 slums of Kolkata, India. The authors have adopted a mixture of cluster sampling and systematic sampling technique. The slums of Kolkata have been segregated into three regions and further segregated by overlaying the population and average monthly income of slums. Slums have been selected randomly from these stratums. Households have been selected from the slums by systematic sampling method.

The Muslim and backward caste households are more deprived with respect to income and access to basic services as compared to Hindu general (upper) caste. Deprivations with respect to income and basic services are more pronounced for households having child than for households not having child. Childbearing households are less likely to receive better water supply, sanitation and drainage services as compared to others due to their religious and residential identities. Slum children get affected by the complex political economy of basic service delivery. The study also finds that electoral competition has positive and political clientelism has negative impact on access to basic services.

The study is based on results obtained from survey in one city of India. Hence, these results cannot be generalized for India or for the developing countries taken together. Further studies across cities of developing countries are required to arrive at any generalized conclusion.

The study suggests that public policies should attempt to disentangle minorities and children from the local political economy. Otherwise, deprivation and disparity even across low income households living in slums would persist. Deprivation of child bearing households would lead to a deteriorating future for the slum children.

This paper have pave the path for new generation public policy for the urban poor and minorities.

This paper highlights the incidence of deprivation of minorities and childbearing households vis-à-vis other households in the slums. It contributes to the overall understanding on urban poverty.

The purpose of this paper is to explore water management practices in four criteria – access to potable water; despoilment or pollution levels; grade of sanitation architecture; and grade of delivery architecture – in a variety of different Latin American and European nations to establish techniques that are currently been utilised in Europe that could improve water management in Latin America.

A systematic review of the available literature on water management in Europe and Latin America is performed to uncover differences and similarities in Latin American and European nations. The documents find are mostly recent, ranging from the last five years (2012-2016).

Some best practices from Europe cannot be applied in Latin America due to lack of funding. Fortunately, this is likely to change, as many Latin American nations’ economies are rapidly improving. Tentative recommendations include installing a system of pipeline that passes through all rural areas, and governments partnering with local businesses to provide sanitation, and regular sanitation and environmental inspections to minimise water pollution. It is also advisable for serious consideration to be given to achieving a measure of universality vis-à-vis water management standards across Latin America.

There is limited information in literature on the analysis of water management in Europe and Latin America, so this paper serves as a reference to fill the gaps, mainly in Latin America because that region is in development compared to European countries with advanced water systems.

This paper aims to assess the progress in the provision of basic services in urban slums in Bangladesh during the transition period of millennium development goals (MDGs) to sustainable development goals (SDGs).

The study used a mixed method of research. The empirical part of the research was conducted in three Blocks of Rupsha slum in Khulna city. Randomly selected 120 households were interviewed through a structured questionnaire; three focus group discussion sessions (FGDs) were also conducted. Progress in the slum residents’ access to basic services during the transition from MDGs to SDGs is tacked based on primary data. The User Satisfaction Index (USI) and Network Analysis tools in ArcGIS are used to identify the gaps in service provision.

Findings show that a very significant proportion of families (56.67%) encounter an acute level of difficulties to gain smooth access to water services. About 89% of respondents have only access to a common or shared toilet facility where one common toilet is used by 20–25 persons. About 31% of families are unable to send their children to primary school even after four years of the adoption of SDGs. Achievements in most indicators of basic services in the slum are in general lower than the national level. Moreover, there exists spatial variability within the same slum. After four years of the transition from MDGs to SDGs, most of the services are poorly satisfying the residents of the Rupsha slum, and water service provision is in worse condition. The findings of this study have unveiled that while achievement in target areas is appreciable at the macro level, at the micro-level; however, good achievement in the provision of few basic services in the low-income settlement is more rhetoric than reality. Therefore, a lot more work needs to be done during the SDG phase to give the slum residents a decent quality of life as they have missed the MDGs’ train.

Study single-out works need to be done during the SDGs phase to give the slum residents a decent quality of life as they have missed the MDGs’ train.

This chapter reflects on the approach and learning of an innovative project in Bangladesh that addresses drinking water security issues of the poor and marginal communities through participatory research, innovation, and social mobilization. The people, living in the most difficult geophysical areas, are facing severe crisis of drinking water and associated health risks due to remoteness, seasonality, social isolation, and poor institutional links. The geophysical constraints such as growing salinity, arsenic, flood and drought, and drawdown of groundwater tables have aggravated the problems. The existing government services hardly reach to the most unserved and needy people because of remoteness and lack of responsiveness of the government departments. A participatory action research project led to collective understanding about the severity of the problems and associated health risks and vulnerability. This again built greater awareness and motivated the poor, women, and marginal communities to establish links with key actors and take various local and collective actions toward ensuring their greater access to drinking water, sanitation facilities, and health services from the relevant government departments and development agencies.

The purpose of this research is to identify and examine the main factors which have explained the sanitation companies' performance and to expand the information on basic sanitation as a way of subsidizing the planners of this important component in the population's quality of life.

The methodological approach used consisted of the selection of a set of 36 indicators from the 26 sanitation companies regarding the year 2003, divided into two groups, with the intent of avoiding spurious correlations. The groups were separated, taking into account their economic, financial and operational features. Subsequently, the indicators were submitted to the factorial analysis, by using the method of the main components extraction.

Based on variables examined it was possible to identify the Operational Management factors: Monitoring and control; Water demand management; Sewage coverage; Urban structure; Environmental protection; Disposition and use of the urban space; Economic and financial capacity; Tariff policies; Collection efficiency; and Liabilities quality as the most representatives ones and those which can better explain the Sanitation Companies' performance.

The results achieved from the factorial analysis intend to be a contribution to the formulation of management actions for the sanitation companies. They may also be used in a city or in a set of cities as a subsidy to the elaboration of various policies.

This article is an innovation as far as it applies the multivariate analysis for the construction of factors which explain the sanitation companies' performance.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze citizen satisfaction with public service delivery in the Sedibeng district municipality of South Africa. The municipality consists of three local municipalities, Lesedi, Emfuleni and Midvaal.

The sampling procedure was carefully designed, taking into account the spatial distribution of the population in the Sedibeng district municipality and the three local municipalities. A structured sample of 1,000 respondents was used for the study and descriptive and inferential statistics approaches were used. The focus was on citizen satisfaction with public service delivery in health care, housing, water, electricity, solid waste removal, community services or overall physical appearance of the community, cutting crimes and job creation.

Respondents are most dissatisfied with roads maintenance, government efforts to create jobs and reduce crime. Respondents from Emfuleni local municipality hold more positive feelings about public service delivery in the area of water, electricity, and solid waste. Their most negative feeling is in the area of job creation, roads and the municipality's efforts in cutting down on crime. On balance, respondents from Lesedi hold positive feelings about public service delivery only in the area of water and electricity supplies. Similarly, their most negative feelings are in the area of job creation, roads, and the municipality's efforts in cutting crime. Respondents from Midvaal do not hold positive feelings about public service delivery in their local municipality. Similar to other two local municipalities, their most negative feelings are in the area of job creation, roads, and the municipality's efforts in cutting crime. Overall, the most negative sentiment about public service delivery has been expressed by respondents from Midvaal, followed by Emfuleni and Lesedi.

It is important for public service delivery in Sedibeng municipality to improve so that citizens' public confidence can rise.

Throughout Africa, governments have been entrusted to finance and provide basic services such as health, education, telecommunications, safe water and modern sanitation. Adequate access to these services enhances development. Public services are a key determinant of quality of life that is not measured in per capita income. They are also an important element of any poverty reduction strategy. Thus, improving public service delivery is one of the biggest challenges in the continent.

Climate variability, accompanied by rapid urbanization and rising population disproportionality, impacts urban poor settlements. This paper aims to analyse the climate resilience for the urban poor in Ahmedabad through the lens of WASH development strategies. To assess the adaptive capacities of urban poor communities, a framework in the form of a vulnerability matrix has been used consisting of four key parameters – tenure, basic services, mobilization and partnership and disaster management capacities. The matrix implicitly recommends area-specific interventions to boost adaptive capacities and improve resilience based on WASH services.

This paper was designed to assess the climate resilience of WASH services in the urban poor settlements of Ahmedabad city. In all, seven slums were selected using a stratified sampling approach considering topography, access to WASH services and urban heat island effect. These slums were then assessed using a theoretical framework having four key parameters – tenure, basic service, mobilization and partnership and disaster management capacities. The data for the analysis was collected from both secondary and primary sources. For the latter, semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders, observational field visits and focused group discussions with the communities were done.

A ladder form of assessment matrix was derived from a thorough literature review and various pre-existing theories. This matrix consists of four key parameters – tenure, basic service, mobilization and partnership and disaster management capacities. The slums were evaluated by applying this framework, and direct and indirect relationships were established between the said parameters.

This paper was adapted in the light of various obstacles put forward by the Covid-19 pandemic. Some of the interviews with the bureaucrats and external researchers were conducted online, while the engagement with the slum dwellers was in-person, considering appropriate social and/or physical distancing norms. Implications of the Covid-19 second wave restricted the involvement of researchers with the communities at an ethnographic level.

The ladder form of vulnerability assessment framework has been developed and contextualized using the insights from literature review, field visits and multi-stakeholder consultations. It was helpful in identifying aspects that require suitable interventions for improving and imparting resilience among the urban poor settlements. The learnings from this paper are significant for planners and decision-makers in identifying and prioritizing context-specific future projects for a city.

The purpose of this paper is to evolve a framework for assessing the efficiencies of municipal solid waste management (MSWM) services.

Stochastic frontier analysis (SFA), a deterministic parametric frontier technique, has been employed for benchmarking of the MSWM services across municipalities in 22 cities in the state of Madhya Pradesh, India.

This paper reviews the solid waste management status and applies SFA to evaluate the relative performances of the services in terms of seven models, of which two models were found significant and acceptable based on the null hypothesis, significance of elasticity of variables, and an absence of data heteroskedasticity. The paper discusses the results in the context of various indicators, and finds that a large number of MSWM municipalities exhibit relative inefficiencies, implying that most municipalities can achieve higher levels of outputs by deploying fewer resources, thereby improving performances without necessarily increasing municipal spendings.

The work suggests some of the changes at the policy level that would affect the way in which solid waste is managed currently in India, and hence the work has social implications whereby the lives of a billion people will be improved through improved solid waste management services.

To the best of the author's information, advanced benchmarking techniques such as SFA have seldom been applied for evolving the efficiencies of solid waste management municipalities, primarily because the sanitation services are yet to take the shape of an industry in the developing world. Lack of availability of data and non‐transparent functions of these services prevent further exploration into estimating the inefficiencies of these service utilities. The paper will be of use to policy makers, solid waste managers, administrators, and sector regulators.