 | The Distributional Incidence of Residential Water and Electricity Subsidies. (0.35mb pdf). April 2006. World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3878. This report highlights that subsidies to residential utility customers are popular among policy makers, utility managers, and utility customers alike, but they are the subject of much controversy. Utility subsidies are seen as a way to help make utility service affordable for poor households, and to keep it affordable as governments seek to raise average prices. |
| Water, Electricity and the Poor: Who Benefits from Utility Subsidies? (English: 2.22mb pdf; Spanish: 3.07 mb pdf)). November 2005. This publication brings empirical evidence on subsidy performance across a wide range of countries. It documents the prevalence of consumer subsidies, provides a typology of the many variants found in the developing world, and presents a number of indicators useful in assessing the degree to which such subsidies benefit the poor, focusing on three key concepts: beneficiary incidence, benefit incidence, and materiality. |
 | Water Week 2005, Session 22: Targeting Subsidies and Output Based Aid to the Poor. March 2005. This session fostered discussion and understanding on whether and how to subsidize services in the water and sanitation sector as well as on emerging thinking on Output-Based Aid approaches (performance-based subsidies) and results from pilot projects to date. The session emphasizes that targeted subsidies and output-based approaches may be an important part of securing and improving the delivery of water and sanitation services, especially to the poor. |
| A series of five papers on "Water Tariffs and Subsidies in South Asia" presents the basics of tariff and subsidy issues and discuss research findings from several cities. Quantitative evidence is presented to demonstrate the extent to which subsidies by-pass the poor in two cities in particular; Bangalore in India and Kathmandu in Nepal. Better ways of delivering targeted assistance to the poor are proposed and discussed. December 2002.  Water Tariffs and Subsidies in South Asia: Understanding the Basics (412k pdf).
Water Tariffs and Subsidies in South Asia: A Scorecard for India (400k pdf) Water Tariffs and Subsidies in South Asia: Tariffs in Six Cities in South Asia - Do They Target Subsidies Well? (466k pdf) Water Tariffs and Subsidies in South Asia: Can subsidies be better targeted? (285k pdf) Water Tariffs and Subsidies in South Asia: Do current water subsidies reach the poor? (386k pdf) |
| Designing Direct Subsidies for the Poor--A Water and Sanitation Case Study. (200k pdf). June 2000. This note illustrates how simulation techniques can be used to inform the design of direct subsidy schemes, ensuring that they are both cost-effective and accurate in reaching the target population. This approach was first used in water sector reforms in Chile in the early 1990s and is an alternative to the traditional method in which governments pay subsidies directly to utilities, often allowing the price of water to fall below economic costs indiscriminately. |
| The Political Economy of Water Pricing Reforms (29.4 mb pdf). April 2000. This book explains the political economy of water pricing reforms. It provides a theoretical and empirical foundation as well as is a collection of five country case studies. This book presents a framework for evaluating and comparing reforms based on Haggard and Webb (1996b), Krueger (1992), White (1990), and Williamson (1994). The suggested framework is only one of many available for explaining reform success. |
| Pricing, Subsidies, and the Poor: Demand for Improved Water Services in Central America (96k pdf). November 2000. The authors argue that the best way to improve outcomes for the poor is to allow tariffs to reflect system costs and meter consumption. This would permit each household to determine how much it wants to spend, while ensuring overall service sustainability. The paper reports that the attitudes of poor communities to metering are generally positive. |
RSS