Paraguay

National institutional support
Paraguay’s urban and rural water and sanitation sectors could benefit from coordination. There are no sector policies or strategies for increasing coverage and sector actions rely more on projects rather than strategies.

The GoAL WaSH project will support the strengthening Government’s liaison with sector actions and stakeholders. A new institution is being formed, responsible for sector policies and strategies and for increasing coverage for water and sanitation towards MDGs. This institution will  also responsible for addressing sector investments to those of greater social impact.

UNDP Paraguay has taken a lead role in the provision of support to the water sector, and has made a significant contribution to sector governance.  Currently a three year programme funded by the Spanish Cooperation Agency (AECID) is under way to strengthens capacities and to define and apply sector policies.

Project Outline
The GoAL WaSH project focuses particularly on the establishment of a national sector lead institution, as well as capacity building in the area of technical and managerial skills in water supply and sanitation.  The key components of the project will include:

• The appointment of a national lead sector institution. Strengthening of the capacity and clarification of its interaction with others institutions. Create a management structure
• Design of national strategy for increasing sanitation coverage, its subsidiary elements, and the process of implementation.
• Support to the lead sector institution to take forward the work of establishing a comprehensive database for the sector, and management indicators.
• Support the study of water and sanitation tariff impact for household economy.

Project Objectives
The key components of the project include:

• The appointment of a national coordinator; the lead sector institution that coordinates sector actions, and establish policies and strategies for developing WSS services and increasing coverage towards the MDG, supported as necessary through technical assistance
• The development of a national strategy for increasing sanitation coverage.
• Support to take forward the work of establishing a comprehensive database for the sector;  which includes sector information for decision making and management indicator  for water supply service (benchmarking) that includes:  coverage and service quality, service cost and efficiency indicators. This intervention will provide timely and reliable information regarding to the status of water supply services, and will contribute to increase sector planning capacity.
• The impact of water and sanitation tariff regarding to the family economy, in order to support of establishing sustainable sector financial policies.

Partners: UNDP Paraguay, Spanish Cooperation Agency (AECID), Government of Paraguay (Ministries of Technical Planning, Public Works, Public Health and Sanitary Services)