Without changes, the goal of ensuring access to water and sanitation for all will not be met. These changes include: clearly linking water management efforts with desired outcomes. Interventions by development partners should focus on addressing shortcomings in physical, governmental and management infrastructures that would reap long-term improvements, not immediate, short-term issues. The private sector can contribute to solutions by applying the Alliance for Water Stewardship in their efforts. Instead of competing, donor organizations should synchronize their endeavors to realize the synergy of their resources. And donor projects should include training to build local water management expertise.

Key Takeaways:

• The global water crisis is not driven by absolute water scarcity, but by a scarcity of governance: there’s enough water to go around, we just need to get better at managing it.
• Global goals and targets might come and go but the pressing needs for improved water management in the real world don’t change.
• Radical improvements throughout the research-policy-action cycle are needed.

“Global goals and targets might come and go but the pressing needs for improved water management in the real world don’t change. Let’s make sure that the ways we deliver it do.”

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2016/jul/19/water-and-sanitation-for-all-we-need-these-five-organisational-changes