water their food crops. kaduna get its drinking water from the kaduna river. asa dam serves as a major water supply for ilorin metropolis. national policies and initiatives nigeria's national water supply and sanitation policy, approved in 2000, encourages private-sector participation and envisages institutional and policy reforms at the state level. however, little has happened in both respects. as of 2007, only four of the 37 states – lagos, cross river, kaduna and ogun states – began to introduce public-private partnerships (ppp) in the form of service contracts, a form of ppp where the responsibility of the private sector is limited to operating infrastructure without performance incentives. while the government has a decentralization policy, little actual decentralization has happened. the capacity of local governments to plan and carry out investments, or to operate and maintain systems, remains low despite efforts at capacity development. furthermore, the national policy focuses on water supply and neglects sanitation. in 2003, a "presidential water initiative (pwi): water for people, water for life" was launched by then-president olusegun obasanjo. the initiative had ambitious targets to increase access, including a 100 percent water access target in state capitals, 75 percent access in other urban areas, and 66 percent access in rural areas. little has been done to implement the initiative and targets have not been met. in 2011, the government voted in the united nations in favor of a resolution making water and sanitation a human right. however, it has not passed legislation to enshrine the human right to water and sanitation in national law. the country is not on track to reach the millennium development goal for water and sanitation. since 2008, community-led total sanitation has been introduced in six states, with the support of unicef and the eu. while not being a national policy, apparently this grass-roots initiative has met with some success. more than 17,000 latrines have been built in 836 communities, and more than 100 of these communities have attained the goal of being declared free of open defecation. responsibilities the three levels of government shares responsibility for the delivery of water supply services. for example, the federal government is responsible for overseeing the water resources management, the state government supplies urban water while local governments work together with communities for rural water supply. the responsibility for sanitation is not always clear, but urban sanitation is a responsibility of state. federal government the federal ministry of water resources, which had been part of the ministry of agriculture for a period until 2010, is responsible for large water resources development projects and water allocation between states. there are 12 river basin development authorities under the ministry, responsible for planning and developing water resources, irrigation work and the collection of hydrological, hydro-geological data. they also provide water in bulk to cities from dams. a utilities charges commission was established in 1992 to monitor and regulate utility tariffs, including those of state water agencies. state governments responsibility for potable water supply is entrusted to state water agencies (swas) or state water departments in the 36 nigerian states. the swas are responsible to their state governments, generally through a state ministry of water resources. swas are responsible for urban water supply, and in some states also for rural water supply. as of 2000, 22 states had separate state rural water and sanitation agencies, mostly set up to implement a unicef program. in 2010, lagos state set up a state wastewater management office under the lagos state water corporation. it took the responsibility for sanitation over from the state ministry of environment. local governments the local government authorities (lgas), of which there are 774, are responsible for the provision of rural water supplies and sanitation facilities in their areas although only a few have the resources and skills to address the problem. only few lgas have rural water supply divisions. communities in some communities in the rural areas, water and sanitation committees (wascos) have been formed to operate and maintain water facilities. these committees are supposed to collect their own water tariffs. donors such as the african development bank have set a requirement that at least 30% of members of wascos must be women. in 1993, the government committed itself to strengthen community participation in rural water supply in a policy document. in the year 2000, the policy had not been disseminated or implemented in all government- or donor-financed programs. civil society nigeria's water and sanitation sector has a vibrant and dynamic civil society implementing several initiatives to address sectoral crisis. the society for water and sanitation (newsan) is the umbrella network of wash ngos, while the water and sanitation media network (website: www.wash-jn.net) comprises journalists reporting the sector. a leading non governmental organisation in the sector is the bread of life development foundation which manages the ewash webblog (www.assemblyonline.info) on water and sanitation news in nigeria. financial aspects tariffs and cost recovery flat rates for unmetered connections. most nigerian water supply connections are not metered. the metering ratio varies from 7% in katsina to 16% in kaduna and 24% in lagos in 2007. unmetered customers are charged a flat rate independent of consumption. for unmetered residential customers the monthly flat rate was us$3 in lagos, us$5 in katsina and us$11 in kaduna. in yobe state it was only naira 100 (us$0.60) per month, the lowest level in the country according to the yobe state water corporation. the tariff revenues covered only 2% of the costs of supplying water. tariffs for metered connections. metered customers are either charged a linear tariff, as it is the case in lagos, or an increasing-block tariff, as it is the case in katsina and kaduna. under the increasing-block tariff, the tariff per cubic meter increases stepwise with consumption beginning at a consumption of 30m3 per month with a total of 3 to 6 blocks. the residential tariff for the first block of consumption is us$0.19 per m3 in kaduna and us$0.44 per m3 in katsina. tariffs for commercial and industrial users are higher. the average water tariff for metered customers was naira 50 per m3 (us$0.30) in oyo state and naira 16 per m3 (us$0.10) in taraba state in 2009. tariff collection. outdated information systems and inconsistent billing practices cause additional revenue losses. the revenue collection rate is very low. in some areas it is less than 10% of billed amounts. there are significant arrears, particularly from government agencies. tariff adjustments. each state sets its own water tariff. tariff adjustments need to be approved by the state executive council through a lengthy procedure. being unable to cover their operating costs, and unable to secure regular revisions of the tariff, the state water agencies receive financial assistance from the state governments. vendor prices. surveys of street vendors in lagos, kaduna and katsina show that they charge as much as 20 times more than the state water agencies. the amount paid, for a very limited volume of supply from private water vendors, can be four to ten times that of one month's much larger volume of tap supply. investment for nigeria to meet the millennium development goal for water supply by 2015, the country needs to invest approximately n215 billion (us$1.3 billion) annually. nigeria is currently investing not more than n82.5 billion (us$0.5 billion) into the sector. much of these investments are needed to rehabilitate infrastructure that has not been properly maintained. it is not clear if the estimate includes sanitation or not. financing while all three government levels are supposed to fully participate in financing water and sanitation investments, local governments often do not have the resources to do so. state and federal levels also provide only limited funding. thus, most public water and sanitation investments in nigeria are financed by donors. the sharing of oil and tax revenues between different levels of government is a politically sensitive issue in nigeria, which is divided between a muslim north and a mostly christian south and where one region in the south accounts for all oil revenues. between 1948 and 2001, nine commissions, six military decrees, one act of the legislature and two supreme court judgements have attempted to define fiscal interrelationships among the component parts of the federation without resolving the issue. federal revenues include about 90 percent of government revenues, including oil royalties and import duties. these are pooled with the more limited state and local revenues, and the pooled resources are then shared by the three levels of government according to an agreed formula. after independence, the federal government received 40% of revenues and the states government also received 60%, an arrangement that would benefit the oil-producing region in the niger delta. local governments had no share. after the biafra war the share of federal government was increased to 80% in 1968, but was subsequently decreased again. since the 1976 local government reform, local government receives its own share of revenues. as of 1999, the share of local government was 20%, the state share was 24% and the share of the federal government and for special projects was 56%. external cooperation the most important external partners in the nigerian water supply and sanitation sector are the african development bank, the european union, japanese jica, unicef, usaid, the ngo wateraid, action against hunger (ngo) and the world bank. the african development bank and the world bank provide loans to the government; the european union, jica and usaid provide grants to the government; unicef and wateraid receive grants from governments and donations from the public to implement their projects in cooperation with, but not through the government. african development bank in february 2012, the african development bank approved a us$100 million soft loan to improve water and sanitation in the northern city of zaria. the project will be implemented by the kaduna state water board. it also approved an urban water supply and sanitation project in the cities of ibadan and jalingo in oyo and taraba states in 2009. both urban projects include the installation of water meters, hygiene promotion as well as the construction of toilets at schools, health clinics, market places and parks. unlike the newer project in zaria, the older project supports reforms at the state level to separate regulatory from operational functions, and the introduction of public-private partnerships. the african development bank also financed rural water and sanitation projects in yobe and osun states approved in 2007. the project aimed to increase the functionality of rural water supply and sanitation facilities in the two states, estimated to be below 50% in 2006, to 100% in 2012. the sanitation facilities built are sanplat latrines and ventilated improved pit latrines. the african development bank finances the entire costs of these projects without requiring a contribution by the nigerian state. the african development bank has invested us$905 million in the sector since 1971. china in 2005, china signed a grant agreement with nigeria to drill 598 boreholes in 18 states and the fct. the amount of the grant and the implementing agency were not specified. european union the eu supports a water supply and sanitation sector reform programme in six states (anambra, cross river, jigawa, kano, osun and yobe) with 87 million euros grant funding. the nigerian state, at all three levels of government, and local communities are expected to contribute another 31 million euros. jica jica is an abbreviation for japan international cooperation agency and they provide grants for rural water supply and sanitation in three states, oyo, kano and yobe. unicef unicef(united nations children's fund) which was formerly known as united nations international children's emergency fund has supported rural water supply, sanitation and hygiene in communities and schools across the country since 2002. its interventions have been financed by dfid and the european commission. a total of 6,960 new safe water sources (boreholes, dug wells and protected springs) and over 19,100 household latrines have been constructed. over 400 schools have been provided with latrines with separate provision for boys and girls and hand washing facilities, usaid usaid(united states agency for international development) supports rural water supply, sanitation and hygiene education in northern nigeria, in 46 communities in bauchi, kano and sokoto states. usaid is partnering with nigerian non-governmental agency women farmers advancement network (wofan), action against hunger (ngo) and wateraid. wateraid wateraid, a british ngo, promoted the integration of