water economics

Economics offers powerful decision and management tools that help to:

* Measure the costs and benefits from water and sanitation investments and policies;
* Assess demand for water and wastewater services and evaluate their relationship to price, income, and other variables;
* Inform decisions regarding the use and targeting of public subsidies, and how to reform tariffs and improve utility finances;
* Evaluate sanitation alternatives and their tradeoffs (choosing, for example, between on-site and off-site systems);
* Assess the costs and benefits of water demand management options, including pricing, leakage reduction, and metering;
* Evaluate the desirability and feasibility of intra- or inter-sectoral water reallocation;
* Assess the efficiency of various modes of service provision (e.g. public vs. private, centralized vs. decentralized);
* Design regulatory and legal frameworks for private sector participation; and
* Evaluate the impact of project or reform on the different actors and stakeholders and devise ways to strengthen institutional frameworks.