Make Water a driver for decentralisation

International cooperation has increased in the water and sanitation sector over the last decade. Besides inter-state cooperation (i.e. Official Development Assistance - ODAs), another form of public cooperation has developed at the municipality level. Through decentralized cooperation municipalities provide institutional, financing and technical support to one another. The objective is to support decentralization in order to scale up municipalities’ technical and financing capacities. 

When in 2010, the United Nations General Assembly declared the access to clean water and basic sanitation as Human Rights, the recognition of one of the main obstacles to the fight against poverty has been highlighted. In fact, the progresses made in the access to drinkable water in the last decades were surprising: between 1990 and 2010, more than 2 billion people began to have access to drinkable water; in the end of 2010, 89% of the world population - 6.1 billion people – already used drinkable water, more 1% than the goal of 88% established in 2001, under the Millennium Development Goal 7 – Ensure Environmental Sustainability.

But our work isn’t finished: 11% of the world population – 783 million people – has no access to drinkable water. Because together we have the responsibility of promoting sustainable development, we count on Glocal Municipalities, that join their community voices to other voices all over the world, to speak out for a more just and sustainable world.