Information Systems│Impact Evaluation│Active Projects
In order to manage a water and sanitation utility, it is essential to have a minimum of reliable information on the physical characteristics of systems, the financial health and the institutional characteristics of the entities that manage them. And for service standards, there must be reliable information for water quality, continuity of supply and reliability of billing. Sadly, such information is very difficult to find at all, or at least to find in an accessible and comparable format in most of Latin America and the Carribean.
Ideally, such information would be collected from service providers by a national entity that is appropriately staffed and funded to undertake such a task. Data would have to be standardized and rigorously checked for quality, in order to ensure comparability and performance benchmarking. Often, however, data are of poor quality and drawn from flawed sources. If an information system works well, however, it can be a powerful tool to assess what kind of approaches work and which ones don’t work through impact evaluations, providing valuable advice to the design of policy instruments.
INFORMATION SYSTEMS
A model national information system for water and sanitation has been created in Brazil, The National Information System on Water, Sanitation and Solid Waste (SNIS) (1.5M pdf) in conjunction with the Bank financed Water Sector Modernization Program (PMSS). Its main objectives are to contribute to the planning and development of public policies, the definition of criteria for the allocation of public resources and the comparative assessment of the performance of service providers. In particular, the federal government uses the information in reviewing financing demands presented by service providers. Service providers must supply data as a condition to access federal credit. SNIS is managed by the National Secretariat for Environmental Sanitation in the Ministry of Cities and has been supported by the World Bank since its establishment in 1995. SNIS is a database of water supply and sanitation (waste water and solid waste) services managed by the Water Sector Modernization Program (PMSS) that collects, processes, analyzes, and disseminates operational, financial, managerial, and service quality data related to these services. Its results are widely published on a website and in a yearbook. More information can be found on the SNIS Website p run by the Government of Brazil.
 Information systems in other countries are more rudimentary or in the stage of being upgraded. In the National Water Commission collects data from urban service providers, but there is no comprehensive system for analyzing and publishing these data. Also, the provision of data is not a condition to obtain federal financing. Currently Mexico is in the process of upgrading its national information system with the help of a World Bank-funded technical assistance project.  Regulatory entities collect data on water and sanitation utilities in many other LAC countries. The Latin American association of water regulators ADERASA has recently undertaken a study on performance benchmarking in its member countries with support of the World Bank and the Public-Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility (PPIAF). The results of the report are expected to become available in 2006.  Some LAC countries have set up rural water information systems, usually consisting of an electronic database of the thousands of rural water boards in each country with some basic information on physical system characteristics and institutional characteristics of each water board. Such information is crucial to plan assistance to water boards in operation, maintenance and rehabilitation of water systems. Honduras has established such a system categorizing each system in four categories from good to bad. However, the system ceased to be updated after Hurricane Mitch that destroyed many water systems and after support by a key donor ended.  Back to Top
IMPACT EVALUATION
Paraguay Impact Evaluation Report: Community-Based Rural Water Systems and the Development of Village Committes, May 1998Â (3M pdf)
This impact evaluation report on three rural water supply (RWS) projects in Paraguay provided loans to the National Environmental Sanitation Service (SENASA) with juntas de saneamiento to finance the provision of safe water and sanitation facilities. Back to Top
ACTIVE PROJECTS
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p - Portuguese only
Updated February 2006
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