Description

The drinking water in the peri-urban area of Cochabamba is almost exclusively produced, distributed and managed by the district-based autonomous community committees. These committees have endured over time but are frequently unable to improve their management which remains very weak.

The proposed five-stage approach aimed to develop and test a management support procedure for these community committees.

1.  Socio-economic diagnostics of the committee aimed at identifying the operating problems and the representation made by users and administration team of these problems;
2. Collective validation of results and selection of three or four priority themes to be processed by working commissions formed on a voluntary basis and facilitated by the researchers;
3.  The administrative commission selected an institutional model after analysing the advantages and disadvantages of various options and developed the content of the internal regulations in detail using a model. The economic commission set water prices by analysing all the costs of the association and income from the tariffs. Scenarios simulated in a spreadsheet were used to test several pricing options to select a suitable tariff. The technical commission checked the reliability of meters and assessed the infrastructures with mounting a call for tenders etc.;
4.  Each commission's proposals were presented to a general meeting for potential amendments and validation;
5.  At the same time, role play sessions (SosteniCAP) were organised, uniting users and the administration team to raise awareness of users to the overall operation of the association, pricing issues and the role of the different stakeholders within the association.

The approach was applied in four drinking water committees. Apart from acquiring internal regulations, even a legal status, it built up the management capacities of the administration team. The role play sessions encouraged improved knowledge on the operation of committees by the users, thereby boosting the social control. Although so far pricing proposals have not been validated collectively, the entire process has enjoyed an improved financial situation (fewer late payments) and a strengthened internal and external institutional legitimacy (with respect to other stakeholders) of drinking water committees in the peri-urban area.