Jamaica's main water agency in urgent need of funds

Jamaica's Natioinal Water Commission, the country's main water service provider, is in urgent need of funding to improve and expand its supply service.

The funds necessary to maintain supply levels exceed the goverment agency's budget, NWC director Mark Barnett said during a recent conference, according to an agency statement.

According to Barnett, the agency would need to invest some US$8.5bn to achieve its 2015-30 investment and supply improvement targets.

The NWC director said that the agency currently invests only 6bn Jamaican dollars (US$46.2mn) a year from different financing sources to address utility problems, while the investment needed to tackle supply service challenges is around 30bn Jamaican dollars per year.

Barnett said that the Jamaican government has not directly transferred any funds to the agency.

"Our cost to provide the services is entirely based on user fees and out of depreciation. Our tariff has never covered full cost nor has it allowed for the level of investment at the lowest cost," Barnett is quoted as saying.

The official said that the challenges facing NWC go beyond the lack of funds. He pointed out to the need for changing the country's water supply management models to address some of the supply problems.

Established in 1980, the NWC supplies 100mn gallons of potable water a day to over 2mn people in Jamaica. It also provides wastewater services to over half a million island residents.

The agency's stated goal is to become the top water utility in Latin America and the Caribbean in terms of coverage, customer satisfaction, reliability, efficiency, viability and compliance by 2020.

According to NWC, the agency has invested over 30bn Jamaican dollars to carry out more than 100 capital projects between 2010 and 2016.

NWC is reportedly owed 20bn Jamaican dollars in unpaid customer bills. The agency is allegedly pondering to sell a portion of that debt to a third party to obtain much needed funding, according to a report by local daily Jamaica Observer.