Africa is a continent which is rapidly urbanising, and it is facing the most severe challenges in provision of basic urban services including water and sanitation among all regions of the world. Providing the urban poor with safe water and sanitation is a critical challenge. In Africa, over half of the urban population is without these basic human needs and they are compelled to make unacceptable compromises of their time, money, safety, dignity and personal development, simply to meet these needs.

The goal of UN-HABITAT's Water and Sanitation Programme is to contribute to the achievement of the water and sanitation related MDGs/WSSD targets in urban areas, with particular focus on Africa, by supporting the creation of an enabling environment for pro-poor investment. The strategic vision of the UNHABITAT Water for African Cities Programme is to reduce the urban water crisis in cities through efficient and effective water demand management, build capacity to reduce the environmental impact of urbanization on freshwater resources and boost awareness and information exchange on water management and conservation.

The Water for African Cities Programme addresses the need for improved management of urban water and sanitation resources in urban areas of Africa since 1999. The first phase of the programme consists of 3 main components: pilot studies, water education and training & capacity building (TCB). The programme was initially funded by the United Nations Foundation for International Partnerships (Turner Foundation) and other agencies . Matching counterpart supports are also obtained from the participating cities/countries.

The ambitions of the Water for African Cities (WAC) project were to:

• Implement an effective Water Demand Management (WDM) strategy in seven demonstration cities for efficient water use by domestic users, industry and public institutions;

• Build capacity at city level to monitor and assess pollution loads entering freshwater bodies from different sources, and put in place early warning mechanisms for timely detection of emerging hotspots of urban pollution;

• Disseminate region wide information and awareness on water conservation in African cities.

Several important outcomes have been achieved as a result of the training activities. A number of action plans were developed and carried out in the different cities. A number of encouraging results have been noted:

• All the cities reported that the increased levels of awareness on water demand management is now yielding fruits in the reduction of UFW.

• In Addis Ababa and Nairobi massive awareness campaigns were launched and this was coupled with improved revenue and billing system. This resulted in increased number of customers paying their bill. As part of the Value-Based Water Education Programme, the Addis Ababa Water and Sewerage Authority has embarked on construction of water education classrooms and were about 80% complete.

• Efforts in water management have included reforestation programmes, for example, in Addis Ababa over 20,000 trees have been planted while also working with partners to improve catchment management.

• Sample studies on pollution from industries were carried out in Addis Ababa and in Accra, solid and water waste disposal sites were identified.

• In an effort to address the pro-poor issues, various efforts were put in place and as a result there is now an increased supply of water to the informal settlements in Nairobi and Lusaka.

• In Accra, the process has helped to establish the multi-stakeholder Densu River Board. The Public Private Partnerships (PPP) efforts in Lusaka have been identified as a resource for strengthening the work of the WAC initiative.

There were a number of factors that contributed to the success of the action plans. These included:

• High commitment of staff who are also qualified and competent

• Regular evaluation of the action plan implementation

• Interest of the various levels in the WAC programme in general

• Success of the WAC pilot studies related to the action plans

• Achievements of result from long term planning

• Consistency in implementation of the plan

• Improved interaction between companies & communities

• Settin benchmarks by regulator on reducing UFW

• Better communication channels between MLM & SLM on issues pertaining to the program.

The Managing Water for African Cities Programme is a collaborative initiative of UNCHS (UN-Habitat) and UNEP within the framework of the United Nations System-wide Special Initiative on Africa. The programme supports African countries to manage the urban water crisis and to protect the water resources. Seven cities participated in the programme: Abidjan (Cote d'lvoire), Accra, (Ghana), Addis Ababa, (Ethiopia), Dakar, (Senegal), Lusaka, (Zambia) and Nairobi, (Kenya).

An essential component of the programme was training African professionals in water demand management and pollution control. This part of the programme is the Water for African Cities project in which UNESCO-IHE took the lead.

This project ended in 2005. Trainings were given to three specific target groups (middle level managers, senior managers and policy & decision makers) in the fields of water demand management and pollution control in an action and result-oriented training programme.

The training of these professionals were implemented at local/national level (middle level managers), regional level (for both senior managers and policy and decision-makers groups). In total about 200 professionals, 25 to 30 professionals for each one of the participating cities, have been trained over an 18 months period.

In addition to training professionals, the project institutionalised the training programme through a capacity building effort that included a training-of-trainers programme and technical support that was directed at existing regional resource centres (mainly NETWAS and CEFOC).

Strengthening of the capacity of these local training centres and regional resource centres were an important component of the programme. This capacity building activity focused on key aspects such as curriculum development, course development, materials development, and the development of didactical and managerial skills.