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The following six issues are fundamental to upgrading programs:
- Costs, financing, and cost recovery
- Water and sanitation issues
- Land tenure and security
- Linkages to other services
- Institutional responsibilities and roles of different stakeholders
Costs, financing, and cost recovery
- Importance of delinking subsidies from standards
- Recognize role of local government subsidies and community contribution
- Importance of mobilizing local financing to improve predictability and reduce reliance on transfers from state and central government level
Water and Sanitation
- Role of private sector, competition, regulation, and attracting foreign investment
- Role of capital markets and using water and sanitation sector as a way to tap into capital markets (e.g., bonds)
- Give due importance to sanitation in order to provide environmentally sustainable solutions and also to deal with health consequences of lack of services
Land tenure and security
- Many solutions exist and there are opportunities to learn from successes
- Need to recognize the role of different forms of tenure and levels of security
- Importance of taking a long term view (>20 years) when seeking solutions
- Need to minimize relocation, keep relocated residents close to services, and maintain rental services for informal settlements
- Availability of simple solutions with appropriate technology (e.g., photography and community verification of ground truth as substitute to aerial maps)
- Land speculation and the need to deal with it
Linkages to other services
- Comprehensive approach to upgrading (social, physical, economic etc)
- Community in drivers seat to define preferences, local government as sandwich filler to ensure synergies
- Need for microfinance to focus on savings, loans, insurance with small and frequent loans but need to link informal to formal systems--examples exist on use of intermediaries as guarantors or deliverers of collateral
- Need clear definition of roles and accountabilities between actors in microfinance and keep costs of coordination/administration low while seeking to integrate and mainstream key elements
Institutional responsibilities and roles of different stakeholders
- Roles and accountabilities between state government, local government, communities, NGOs and role of subsidiarity--in financing, implementation, design, maintenance etc and by who initiates, executes, supports, or finances
- Need for agreements with utilities and other service providers, especially in the context of privatization on roles and accountabilities but also on prices/charges
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