Presentation made at Mediterranean Economic Week in Marseille, France on 4-7 November 2015 by Oriana Romano, Water Governance Initiative consultant, OECD. www.oecd.org/gov/regional-policy/watergovernanceprogramme.htm

1. Water Governance in Cities: an
OECD perspective
Oriana Romano, OECD Water Governance Programme

2. Analytical framework for assessing water governance in cities
• Survey across 48 cities
(OECD and non-OECD
countries)
• Fact-based and perception
based indicators
Source : OECD, 2015 forthcoming, Water Governance in OECD Cities, OECD Publishing, Paris

3. Keywords associated with "water management in cities”
Source : OECD, 2015 forthcoming, Water Governance in OECD Cities, OECD Publishing, Paris

4. Factors triggering changes in water governance
Source : OECD, 2015 forthcoming, Water Governance in OECD Cities, OECD Publishing, Paris

5. Capacity challenges at
sub-national level
Financial
capacities
Technical
capacities
Human
capacities
Funding gap
Which obstacles hinder the financial sustainability of water
management in your city?
Capacity gap
Which capacity challenges hinder the performance of water
management in your city?
Source : OECD, 2015 forthcoming, Water Governance in OECD Cities, OECD Publishing, Paris

6. The “3 Ps” coordination framework
Cities
complex
interactions
People
PlacesPolicies

7. PEOPLE
Multiplicity of non-governmental actors
with a stake in urban water governance
• Service providers (main counterparts
of city departments ( 79%)
• Civil society and Business (not frequent interaction)
• Irrigators and their association ( rare interactions)
Focus on  Stakeholder engagement
• Building trust and ownership
• Securing the willingness to pay for water services
• Raising awareness on current and future water challenges
• Ensuring the accountability of city managers and service providers to end users and citizens
• Managing conflicts on water allocation
• Ensuring the political acceptability of different ownership models
• Setting convergent objectives across policy areas.
Source : OECD, 2015 forthcoming, Water Governance in OECD Cities, OECD Publishing, Paris

8. PLACES
• 75% of surveyed cities reckon water quality and 73% flood control
as the major issues generating interdependencies between cities and
surrounding areas
• Cities coordinate with rural areas and other municipalities:
46% of cities implemented inter-municipal co-ordination mechanisms
Urban-rural interdependences
Focus on Rural- Urban partnerships
• A positive two-way interaction between rural and urban areas
should be promoted to build synergies, manage trade-offs and
foster complementarities across places and policies.
• Rural-urban partnerships can help integrate water management
between cities and their hinterland
Source : OECD, 2015 forthcoming, Water Governance in OECD Cities, OECD Publishing, Paris

9. POLICIES
• Land use and spatial planning (81%), Energy (77%)
and territorial development (71%)
mainly influence water challenges in surveyed cities
• Surveyed cities coordinate across sectors
through planning, but also through contracts (energy, agriculture)
coordination groups (territorial development, environment)
Focus on  policy complementarities
• Managing conflicts on water allocation
• Efficiently allocating resources (e.g. for alternative use of
water as in the energy sector);
• Increasing capacity (e.g. by combining management of
multiple sectors – waste, water, energy)

10. Top priorities to cope with future water challenges
Source : OECD, 2015 forthcoming, Water Governance in OECD Cities, OECD Publishing, Paris

11. THANK YOU
oriana.romano@oecd.org
WWW.OECD.ORG/GOV/WATER