WATER GLOBAL PRACTICE KNOWLEDGE BRIEF Knowledge Exchanges on Integrated Urban Water Management Briefing Note 1—January 2019 Addressing urban water challenges through South-South knowledge exchanges that promote integrated approaches How can knowledge exchanges help Ethiopia, Ghana, and more integrated solutions. The knowledge exchanges, Indonesia—all of which face similar complex urban water funded by the South-South Facility (SSF), the Global Water challenges—learn from Brazil? Security and Sanitation Partnership (GWSP), and several country-level programs, are concentrated around four events: an exchange visit to Brazil to learn from opera- Summary tional experiences followed by three in-­ country work- shops to bring together local stakeholders and discuss For several years, a team of urban and water specialists has the application of integrated approaches in development been promoting more integrated approaches to address- projects. To increase stakeholder engagement and the ­ ing complex and inter-connected urban water challenges. Based on concrete demands from Ethiopia, Ghana, and dissemination of progress and results, an online platform and a series of briefing notes are being developed and dis- Indonesia after a Technical Deep Dive (TDD) on Integrated seminated at specific events. Urban Water Management (IUWM)1 in Japan in September 2017, the IUWM team initiated a series of South-South This is the first Briefing Note on the SSKE events, describing Knowledge Exchange (SSKE) activities. The Exchanges the outcomes of the June 2018 knowledge exchange visit aim to raise awareness among stakeholders and actors to Brazil. Twenty-three country representatives and nine from the three countries on the potential benefits of the World Bank staff from Ethiopia, Ghana, and Indonesia  – IUWM approach and to build their capacity to implement including two Ministers, a Deputy Minister, and a Mayor— three Brazilian and international experts, and four 1. The IUWM Technical Deep Dive was organized by the Tokyo organizing Bank staff visited the two Brazilian cities of Development Learning Center (TDLC), a program in the World Bank’s São Paulo and Teresina. São Paulo is a mega-city that has Social, Urban, Rural, and Resilience Global Practice (SURR GP), and addressed serious urban water issues—from water scarcity co-financed by the Water GP’s Water Partnership Program (WPP). and flooding to informal settlements and water supply, 1 What is Integrated Urban Water Management (IUWM)? Integrating urban and water considerations through a holistic planning approach allows cities to prioritize investments in pursuit of a livable, greener, competitive, and more resilient city. This can be realized at the investment or project level by involving stakeholders of linked or affected sectors, as well as at a programmatic level by developing a holistic masterplan or framework with different stakeholders. Economic analyses can be used to show the often positive medium- to long-term impacts of integrated solutions, and financial analyses to identify different options for securing additional funds, such as through private sector involvement and revenue increases. IUWM is not a new concept; its principles have been outlined elsewhere before and are referred to in a variety of ways.2 The IUWM approach can help developing countries sequence and prioritize integrated activities and investments under a common holistic vision or strategy aimed at addressing challenges. However, it is important to note that IUWM is not a framework or methodology that can or should be applied to all cities indiscriminately. sanitation, and pollution—through several projects over a Ethiopia, Ghana, and Indonesia: Urban couple decades. Teresina, meanwhile, is a medium-sized Water Challenges town that integrated several (sub-) sectors in the urban The three countries participating in the knowledge area at project level. Both cities clearly showed how inte- exchange visit to Brazil face severe urban water challenges gration beyond the traditional borders between sectors that are interconnected, urgent, and complex, and which and active stakeholder involvement can lead to significant involve several (sub-) sectors and public and private stake- additional benefits for urban inhabitants.2 holders. While these countries each have a set of unique The main takeaways from action plans formulated by the local characteristics and issues, they face several common three participating countries during the exchange in Brazil are challenges: related to: • The impact of rapid urbanization (often in informal set- • The benefits of long-term vision and an integrated tlements) and overall underinvestment in infrastruc- strategy; ture, combined with uncoordinated urban planning, has • Active community collaboration and stakeholder negated the potential growth and development benefits engagement; of rapid urbanization. With low levels of service coverage and unreliable piped water supply services, many house- • Approaching the city as an ecosystem within the larger holds and commercial and industrial entities rely on water basin; groundwater as their main water source. In all three coun- • The need for inclusive and pro-poor service provision; tries, inefficient solid waste collection and management is • The role of champions to move the IUWM agenda for- contributing to the pollution of streams and deterioration ward locally; and of drainage infrastructure, resulting in more flooding. • The presence of concrete opportunities in each country • Land use changes have led to a deterioration of water qual- to apply integrated principles in projects—countries are ity and depletion of aquifers. Cities that rely on rivers as counting on World Bank support to achieve this. their main water source face issues with increased turbidity and sediments that often disrupt treatment processes. On These and other relevant aspects will be the focus of the the other hand, cities that rely on springs and groundwater follow-up in-country workshops planned for 2019. sources face reduced flow capacity. Absence of adequate wastewater management and treatment has also contrib- uted to the pollution of many rivers by domestic and indus- 2. The concept of Integrated Urban Water Management has for example trial waste, as well as groundwater contamination. been illustrated as Cities of the Future (IWA) and Water Sensitive Cities (Wong 2009) and referred to with different acronyms • Climate change is increasing disaster risks. The poorest (e.g. Sustainable Drainage Systems (SUDS), in the United Kingdom, and most marginalized populations tend to live in high- or Water Sensitive Urban Design (WSUD), in Australia). risk areas prone to flooding, landslides, sea level rise, 2 Knowledge Exchanges on Integrated Urban Water Management Briefing Note 1—January 2019 and water shortages during drought, compounding their the impressive community involvement brought about by vulnerability. the municipality. • Limited capacity at the local level hampers implemen- The Metropolitan Region of São Paulo (MRSP) is home to tation. Funding levels often do not match the increased close to 20 million inhabitants and represents 19.4 percent responsibilities of local authorities, which combined with of Brazil’s national economy. The water resources of this complex administration structures and overlapping gov- sprawling metropolitan region have been strained by dra- ernment agencies results in duplication and gaps in the matic population growth, unplanned land use, and rapid delivery of their mandates. industrial development. These trends have contributed to rising pollution in drinking water reservoirs, growing water Brazilian Experiences: São Paulo and Teresina scarcity, and flood vulnerability. These challenges have In the past 10 years, the Municipality of Teresina has focused been further exacerbated by inadequate provision of urban efforts on implementing an IUWM program in Lagoas do services and inefficient water use, setting a tall order for Norte, an environmentally and socially vulnerable area of water management authorities. the city inhabited by 100,000 of the city’s 840,000 residents. Over the past three decades, in response to the pressing The area was subject to frequent flooding and it lacked crit- need for municipal and sectoral collaboration, São Paulo ical urban services, including water supply and sanitation. has developed its own IUWM approaches, working around With support from a World Bank loan, the city implemented a complex institutional structure involving a large and the first phase of an integrated investment program that diverse set of institutions and local governments. During focused on developing drainage, water supply, sanitation, the exchange visit, participants learned from the city’s vast urban planning and infrastructure (such as roadways, parks, body of knowledge and experience of what has and hasn’t and recreational and cultural spaces), and on improving pub- worked in these efforts. The São Paulo water and wastewa- lic services. The program’s second phase is currently under ter management company (SABESP), the Municipality of São implementation, replicating the benefits and expanding the Paulo, and the State Government (through the Secretariat geographical reach of the program to all the residents of of Sanitation and Water Resources) are the key players in Lagoas do Norte, incorporating lessons from the first phase. coordinating and moving IUWM programs and initiatives During the exchange visit, city officials provided firsthand forward. Officials of these organizations presented the inte- knowledge about the impact and challenges of implement- grated slum upgrading program developed for the shores ing integrated urban water interventions and communi- of the Guarapiranga reservoir, the Córrego Limpo (Clean cated their decision to adopt an integrated model for most Stream) Program and the Pacto das Águas (Water Pact). of the city’s infrastructure investments going forward. In addition, the participants were able to concurrently see the Relevance of Brazil Experiences drastic change brought by the implementation of the first phase by visiting the areas where the project has not yet Participants called the knowledge exchange visit to São intervened, which provided a visual “before project” sce- Paulo and Teresina “Inspiring and eye-opening,” “relevant nario and a vivid illustration of the intervention’s positive for ongoing projects,” and a “very good showcase that every impact. Throughout the visit, participants commented on poor city/town [can have a] bright future.” In São Paulo, the participants valued the city’s long-term commitment to PHOTO 1. Dense upgraded slums along the Guarapiranga achieve results, a commitment that was institutionalized Reservoir, São Paulo, Brazil through innovative laws and policies and under challeng- ing and complex conditions requiring the involvement of several different institutions, stakeholders, and—crucially— local communities. In Teresina, government officials from Ethiopia, Ghana, and Indonesia appreciated their visits to the new multi-­ purpose park that serves as a buffer during high-water episodes and is also enjoyed by the local commu- nities for cultural and recreational activities, which the par- ticipants got a glimpse of during the site visits. Brazil’s experience with rapid unplanned urbanization and IUWM has proven to be very relevant to Ethiopia, Ghana, and Indonesia. These countries—along with many others, espe- cially in Africa and East Asia—have a large number of rapidly Source: © Illuminati Films/World Bank. Further permission required for reuse. growing medium-sized cities that need to focus on integrated Knowledge Exchanges on Integrated Urban Water Management Briefing Note 1—January 2019 3 PHOTO 2. Learning from Brazilian experts during the • The city can be approached as an ecosystem with its own knowledge exchange visit to Brazil, June 2018 water cycle that is linked to the water basin the city is located in. • Community participation plays a crucial role in the suc- cess of resettlement and the protection of water sources and the urban environment more broadly. In the end, it better is the affected community that will pay—either for ­ services after resettlement or for damages in the old unsustainable setting. • Clear mechanisms for cost recovery, a long-term financ- ing scheme, and approaches specific to the poor are needed for sustainable and inclusive service provision. • It is important to identify champions to move forward the IUWM agenda and its many activities locally. Source: © Illuminati Films/World Bank. Further permission required for reuse. • There are concrete opportunities in each country to urban water planning and investments in order to leapfrog to apply the principles of the integrated approach in ongo- sustainability while providing better services and quality of ing and pipeline projects. life to their citizens. • World Bank support is needed in terms of technical sup- port, capacity building, and increased financing through The Brazilian and international experts accompanying the Bank projects. event emphasized the importance and relevance of learning from a country like Brazil, which faces and has overcome The World Bank will address the last point by organizing similar challenges to the cities represented by the delega- national workshops, planned for 2019, in the three partic- tions. Presentations also included experiences in solving ipating countries. The workshops will provide an oppor- urban water challenges through the integrated planning of tunity to tailor learnings and discussions to each country’s nature-based infrastructure throughout the city, and recent specific challenges and focus on the application of inte- work in reclaiming slum areas through community engage- grated principles in development projects, ensuring that the ment and natural solutions in Indonesia and Fiji. experiences from the SSKE and the expertise of the resource people are best leveraged for each context. The next Briefing Next Steps Note on the IUWM SSKE events will describe the activities During the exchange visit, each country team prepared and results of the first of the three in-country workshops. an action plan summarizing their key takeaways, ele- To maximize knowledge sharing between the three coun- ments applicable to their own context, critical activities for tries and Brazil (and beyond), the IUWM team will also facil- ­ follow-up, and a timeline, as well as the need for World Bank itate a multi-stakeholder multi-country dialogue between support in implementing the IUWM agenda. The main take- the study tour and national workshop participants, Brazilian aways from these action plans are summarized as follow: and other global experts, and Bank staff through an online • A well-defined governance structure, with active col- platform. The IUWM team envisions the platform to become laboration and integrated planning across sectors is key an active hub for knowledge sharing on IUWM and foresees to ensuring buy in from all stakeholders and facilitating it growing beyond the proposed countries and involved inclusive local development. experts into a IUWM Community of Practice. ­ ank. Some rights ­ © 2019 International Bank for Reconstruction and Development / The World B reserved. The find- ings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this work do not necessarily reflect the views of The World Bank, represent. The World Bank does not guarantee the accuracy its Board of Executive Directors, or the governments they ­ work. This work is subject to a CC BY ­ of the data included in this ­ (https://creativecommons.org/ 3.0 IGO license ­ /­ licenses​ ­ ontent. It is your responsibility by/3.0/igo). The World Bank does not necessarily own each component of the c ­ wner. 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