By Chris Mugasha
The long week high level continental 22nd African Water and Sanitation Association (AfWASA) International Congress and Exhibition (ICE) ended on Thursday.
This has been Uganda’s 4th time hosting the event that pulled over 1000 delegates and exhibitors from 40 countries.
The delegates gathered at Munyonyo in Kampala to discuss opportunities and challenges in accessing water and sanitation in Africa under the theme of; AfWASA ICE2025 water and Sanitation for All: A Secure Future for Africa.
It was organized by Uganda’s National Water and Sewerage Corporation (NWSC) an agency of the Ministry of Water and Environment, on behalf of the government of Uganda in association with local partners and the AfWASA Executive office.
AfWASA outgoing President who is also the NWSC’s Managing Director Dr. Eng Silver Mugisha explains that Uganda has been consistently chosen because of its transformational initiatives that have been undertaken by NWSC in expanding access to safe water and sanitation. Mugisha handed over to Dr. Blaise Moussa (Managing Director Cameroun Water Utilities Corporation.)
“NWSC has been recognized as a leader in transformational initiatives aimed at actualizing water for all,” he said.
The initiatives include; the aggressive Water for All programme, infrastructure development for service delivery, 100% acceleration programme (SCAP100), home-grown IT and business solutions and Innovative infrastructure financing models. Others are stakeholder engagement and customer experience, among others; provide great opportunities for learning and sharing practical experiences and solutions.
“The location of Uganda in the heart of Africa and its exquisite fauna and flora make it a much better destination for business, tourism, research and study events,” Mugisha explains.
Among the key issues and topics that were discussed and tackled, Mugisha says, with just a few years left to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), two in five Africans or 411 million people, still lack access to safe drinking water and only two out of the 54 countries are on track to achieve universal basic sanitation.
“Safe water and sanitation are critical in shaping and securing Africa’s future and so AfWASA –ICE2025 aimed at bringing to the forefront the good, practical and tested practices and experiences, new knowledge and innovation,” he explains.
“Collaborations and partnerships and financing solutions are key in accelerating access to safe water and sanitation for all of Africa.”
Brief facts about AfWASA
AfWASA is a professional association of establishments, enterprises and utilities operating in the areas of drinking water, sanitation and environment. It has over 237 members of whom 100 members are utilities from over 40 countries across the continent.
AfWASA International Congress and Exhibition (AfWASA ICE) is organized by AfWASA, as part of the mechanisms to enhance the exchange of ideas and recent developments in the water and sanitation sector. It’s a continental platform for sharing experiences and knowledge management in the water and sanitation sector, which brings together water and sanitation services providers, and operators, sectoral regulators, policy makers, financiers and development partners, practitioners as well as manufacturers and suppliers of utility infrastructure and key operational inputs on the African continent to share knowledge and best practices in the sector.
Current state of NWSC
NWSC’s geographical coverage has increased from 36 towns to 276 towns by June 2024. NWSC now covers 10800 villages with a population of 19million people being served by June, 2024.
NWSC’s targets in the next five years (2024-2029 Strategic direction)
-Grow geographical coverage from the current 276 towns to over 300 towns
-Grow connections from 950,000 to 1,250,000
-Grow population served from 19million to 25million people in areas gazetted for NWSC.
-Increase annual turnover from sh642.8billion to sh745billion.
-Increase total assets base from Sh4.5trillion to sh6.2trillion.
-Improve staff engagement Index from 70% to 80%
-Maintain a customer satisfaction index of 80%.
End.
