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Affordable Water Pricing for Slums Dwellers in Dhaka Metropolitan Area: The Case of Three Slums
Abstract
Ensuring affordable and equitable access to safe water for all in urban areas is a major water management challenge for Bangladesh. Both the availability and the quality of water are declining in the poor urban areas, especially in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh. Lack of access to affordable drinking water in the slums of Dhaka metropolitan area (DMA) poses a major challenge for Bangladesh to achieve target 6.1 of the United Nations sustainable development goals which aims to provide equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all by 2030. The aim of this research is to address the following question: Are slum dwellers in Dhaka metropolitan area capable for paying for Dhaka water supply and sewerage authority’s (DWASA) services? This study focused on three slums in Dhaka metropolitan area namely Korail slum, Godown slum and Tejgaon slum to determine the current water price in these slums and to compare it with the water price of DWASA. Results show that for domestic water use slum dwellers are paying about 7 to 14 times higher than the legal connection holders covered by DWASA. Slum dwellers are spending about 12 to 15% of their average monthly income for domestic water supply, whereas in most of the countries, legal connection holders are spending less than 5% of their average monthly income for the same purpose. For secure water supply, all the respondents in these three slums are willing to pay 3.4 times more than the current water price of DWASA. Finally, it is concluded that the slum dwellers of the three selected slums in Dhaka metropolitan area are capable to pay for DWASA services.
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3759/jowrem.v3i1.1822
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