Innovative Water Finance in Africa

Water has become increasingly central to addressing multiple development and environmental objectives in the course of climate change. Exploring the multiple dimensions of water governance, policy and management in a holistic way is thus imperative for financial innovations to take place in the water sector. This book constitutes, first of all, a reference document allowing African managers and policymakers to broaden their knowledge of financing strategies and tactics in order to raise funds for water services provision and water resources development. Additionally, the book reviews the agenda on water and sanitation services in order to ensure water resources development has a place in funding structures. The book presents and discusses contemporary instruments of financing water services and water resources development in Africa. In this regard, three major thematic areas are recognized as key: Coverage of the legal and institutional contexts pertaining to water financing innovations; an assessment of economic mechanisms and principles subtending financial innovations in the water sector; and applications of innovative water financing mechanisms based on scale formation and adoption practices. This book highlights the principles of economic profitability and financial sustainability to enable creditworthiness and a snowball effect of borrowing, and will be of interest to researchers, policymakers, and academics, as well as development agencies and financiers of sustainable development and environmental (Blue and Green) economies. Cush Ngonzo Luwesi is Full Professor of Economics of Water and Climate Change and Director of Postgraduate Studies at Ballsbridge University, Curacao (OdeL), and a member of Scientific Advisory Committee of the Climate Research for Development in Africa (CR4D) program at UNECA. He is also a former Focal Region Manager of the CGIAR Research Program on Water, Land and Ecosystems (WLE) in the Niger and Volta Basins, at the International Water Management Institute (IWMI). Atakilte Beyene is an international freelance consultant working on food security and natural resource management. He is also a former senior researcher at the Nordic Africa Institute (Sweden) and at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences and as well as other research institutes and organizations in Sweden, Ethiopia and Tanzania.