Adequate water supply and sanitation are the two major focus areas under the Sustainable Development Goals. Southeast Asian (SEA) countries are working towards ensuring universal coverage of these two basic services. According to the World Health Organization’s Joint Monitoring Report 2019, 91 per cent of the population in the region had access to drinking water in 2017 as compared to just 79 per cent in 2000. As per the Association of Southeast Asian Nations report, countries like Singapore and Brunei Darussalam have 100per cent coverage whereas regions like Cambodia, Lao PDR and Indonesia lag behind in the provision of potable water with a coverage of less than 80 per cent.
With respect to the provision of sanitation services, only Singapore has universal sanitation coverage while Indonesia has less than 70 per cent coverage. There has been improvement in the proportion of population under basic sanitation coverage in smaller economies like Cambodia and Lao PDR, but it is short of demand.
To bridge this gap, measures related to policy reforms, adoption of innovative technologies and new capacity building initiatives were taken up in the last one year across the region. These initiatives act as a catalyst in scaling up basic services to a larger population.
Sector trends
Policy impetus: In the last one year, SEA countries have introduced several policy reforms in the water supply and waste management segment that are much needed to overcome long-standing policy paralysis.
Philippines: In November 2019, the House Committees of Government Reorganization and Public Works had approved a consolidated bill allowing the creation of the Department of Water Resources that would ensure reliable, safe, quality and affordable water supply for all. With the formation of this new department, comprehensive and integrated planning, policy formulation and management of water resources in the region will be taken care of by a single national agency.
For the sanitation sector, the Department of Health launched two policies, that seek to improve sanitation in the country by constructing toilets and eradicating open defecation. Launched in November 2019, the two policies are the Implementation Guidelines on the Philippine Approach to Sustainable Sanitation and the National Standards on the Design, Construction, Operation and Maintenance of Septic Tank Systems in Manila. These policies aim to achieve zero open defecation status in the region by 2025.
Cambodia: In January 2019, the sewerage management and construction department under the Ministry of Public Works and Transport (MPWT) launched a guideline on wastewater system operation and maintenance. This guideline has been jointly developed by the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), GIZ and MPWT to offer detailed technical information related tothe inspection, cleaning, repairing, monitoring, sampling and testing required for the efficient operation of different wastewater management systems.
Later, in April 2019, the United Nations Industrial Development Organization and the GGGI signed a technical cooperation agreement to jointly improve waste recycling in Battambang. Under the agreement, the two organisations will jointly work to reduce open burning of waste and develop a waste recycling system.
Thailand: In June 2019, the Bangkok cabinet approved the 20-year master plan for the country’s water management system. The approved plan pertains to six key areas which will provide a roadmap for development of required infrastructure. The areas covered are water security for the farming sector, flood management, water quality management, water resource preservation, prevention and mitigation of soil erosion in watershed areas and water management. As part of the plan, the government aims to supply running water to 75,032 villages by 2030 and to develop water resources to increase volumes to 27 billion cubic metres for the agricultural sector, apart from other provisions.
Infrastructure development
Capacity addition has been one of the key agendas of the respective governments and this is clearly visible as several projects began operations. In Singapore, the Ministry of Environment and Water Resources unveiled the Choa Chu Kang Waterworks (CCKWW) in August 2019. The plant has been upgraded at a cost of S$162 million to process 40 mgd of raw water.
Similarly, in Bangkok, a 7 mld water reclamation plant in the Amata City Rayong Industrial Estate was launched in January 2019. The plant was jointly developed by the AnuRAK Water Treatment Facilities Co. Limited and Amata Water Co. Limited on a PPP basis.
In the Philippines, a big-ticket project, Phase I of the Bulacan Bulk Water Supply Project, was commercially operationalised by the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System. The project, worth PhP 24.4 billion, was developed by consortium of San Miguel Corporation and Korea Water Resources Corporation on a PPP basis.
Maynilad Water Services Incorporated also inaugurated the second Putatan water treatment plant (PWTP) in April 2019 to source raw water from Laguna Lake. The plant produces 100 mld of potable water to supply to Maynilad customers. Apart from this, the water agency broke ground for the biggest sewage treatment plant – the Camana (Caloocan-Malabon-Navotas) Water Reclamation Facility – worth PhP 10.5 billion to clean waterways flowing into Manila Bay and improve sanitation conditions in three cities.
In Vietnam too, the first phase of the Duong River surface water treatment plant was launched on September 5, 2019. Phase I of the project, which cost around 5 trillion dong, was developed by the Duong River Surface Water JSC to provide 300,000 cubic metres per day of clean water for approximately 3 million people in Hanoi and some adjacent areas in Bac Ninh and Hung Yen provinces.
New contracts
Singapore: In July 2019, a contract to deliver a reverse osmosis (RO) system for the Jurong Island Desalination Plantwas awarded to IDE Technologies. The plant, the fifth in the country, will have the capacity to provide 35.7 mgd (135,000 m3/day) of desalinated water. Apart from this, in December 2019, two contracts were signed between the Public Utility Board and SUEZ to supply water management solutions worth $11.9 million in Singapore and in Malaysia. In Singapore, SUEZ is required to expand and maintain the system for real-time monitoring and optimisation of reservoir and catchment operations for a period of four years.
In Malaysia, SUEZ is required to provide two drinking water production plants to meet the country’s increasing water demand. The plants are expected to be installed by mid-2020 to produce 64,000 m3/day of drinking water.
Cambodia: In November 2019, Vinci Construction won a $200 million contract to build a drinking water treatment plant in Phnom Penh. The plant will be developed in two phases. In Phase I, a treatment line with a capacity of 195,000 m3/day and an intake structure at the Mekong River with a capacity of 390,000 m3/day will be developed at a cost of $ 155 million. Apart from this, two 1.5 km pipelines to carry water from the source and a 7.8 km long pipeline to bring drinking water to over 500,000 inhabitants of the capital city will be laid. In Phase II, the capacity of the plant will be doubled to 390,000 m3/day at a cost of $45 million.
Earlier, in January 2019, Ramboll was selected by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to take up a water supply and sanitation project covering three towns – Battambang, Kampong Cham and Sihanoukville – and the UNESCO Heritage city of Angkor Wat. As part of the project, Ramboll will develop a new wastewater treatment plant and new sewers in Battambang, a septage management system in Kampong Cham and a new trunk sewer in Siem Reap, apart from expansion of the capacity of the wastewater treatment system in Sihanoukville.
Technological advances
Technology advancements in select infrastructure projects were also introduced in the region. For instance, the second PWTP uses a multi-stage process of filtration involving dissolved air flotation, biological aerated filter, ultrafiltration, RO, and chlorination to treat the water from Laguna Lake.
Other than this, the upgraded CCKWW in Singapore is based on a ceramic membrane system, which is more energy and cost efficient than polymeric membranes. These new membranes incur only 1 per cent of water loss compared to 5 per cent in the case of a polymeric membrane system and can last for 20 years. A chemical-free technology that uses ozone treatment has also been applied at water treatment plants in Kelantan.
Multilateral and innovative funding
Funding from multilateral agencies continues to be the driving force for developing water and waste infrastructure in ASEAN. In November 2019, ADB and Cambodia’s Ministry of Economy and Finance signed two agreements worth $89 million to boost access to water supply and sanitation services in rural areas and to improve the country’s efforts to develop its financial sector. The Cambodian governmen, which has made a commitment of becoming open defecation free by 2025, will also leverage a new development impact bond (DIB) to help 1,600 villages in six provinces. The $10 million DIB is the first such initiative launched by the Stone Family Foundation, International Development Enterprises, and the US Agency for International Development.
Conclusion
The measures taken by SEA countries make it evident that the region is committed to meeting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). However, challenges such as macroeconomic instability, regional conflicts over water sharing, and lack of data and well-defined medium-term financing strategies create impediments in meeting the targets.
In many places, the provision of water services is also inadequate and unequal, with disparity of access between urban and rural areas. Water privatisation, in some cases, has contributed to poor coverage and high prices. Lastly, lack of governance has also created barriers in scaling up services to a larger population in SEA, which needs to be addressed to ensure universal coverage.
