'Enhancing investment decisions aimed at addressing integrated water-related-challenges in sub-Saharan Africa'

“Water is a global challenge, however, there is a consensus that social and ecological impacts of water- related issues are disproportionately higher in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The world water crisis is increasingly seen as a crisis of governance rather than scarcity, echoing the importance of governance for sound water management. Recent development literature has focussed a great deal on Capacity Development (CD) and Joint Knowledge Production (JKP), even linking these to water governance. However, developing and evaluating governance capacities and JKP in practice is challenging, let alone identifying where to prioritise investments aimed at improving such intangible concepts. Considering that USD 22,5 trillion of investments in the water sector will be required until 2050, it is of absolute importance to guide investment decisions, especially those aimed at improving governance.
Therefore, the main aim of this research is to provide additional insight into how integrated urban water governance capacity assessments can be used to inform local investment priorities and decisions of multilateral development banks in the SSA context. In order to do this, the (following) City Blueprint Approach frameworks were employed to assess integrated urban water management and governance. It will also be tested whether they can do this in a systematic, holistic and reproducible fashion and inform investment decisions.”

(Citation: Jaax, F. – Enhancing investment decisions aimed at addressing integrated water-related-challenges in sub-Saharan Africa (2020))