governorates in 2010, and was lower in other governorates. most industrial and commercial water users were metered, while few residential users are metered. example: greater beirut water supply beirut receives most of its drinking water from the jeita spring in mount lebanon (shown in the background). the public water supply system in greater beirut receives its water from the jeita springs (50 million m3/year) as well as well fields in the damour region (30 million m3/year). the jeita spring is the source of drinking water for about 1.5 million lebanese. water is treated in the dbaiye water treatment plant north of the city with a capacity of 430,000m3/day (157 million m3/year). besides the public network, around 1,000 mostly private wells are scattered in the area of beirut. their depth varies between 50 and 300m and their average individual discharge is 35 liters/second. total water supply from these wells could be higher than through the public water supply, depending on how many hours the pumps run. overpumping from wells in the beirut area has led to seawater intrusion into aquifers. the government plans to tap the awali river to the southeast of beirut to provide the growing capital with 90 million m3/year of additional water, more than double the current resources. the project involves the construction of a dam at bisri, a 3 km tunnel from the river to a new water treatment plant at ouardaniye, and a second 22 km tunnel to khalde south of beirut, from where water will be transported through two twin pipelines, one going north to the center of beirut and the second northeast to baabda. the islamic development bank has agreed to finance the construction of bisri dam in 2008, while the world bank has approved a us$200m loan in december 2010 to partly finance the transmission tunnels and pipelines. lebanese critics of the project argue that the awali river and especially the litani river, from which water is diverted to the awali river upstream of the planned intake, are highly polluted. they also say that less expensive alternatives, such as the less polluted damour river that is also closer to beirut, were not considered by the government and the world bank. as of december 2013, less than 1 percent of the loan has been disbursed and no civil works contract has been awarded. modern history the lebanese infrastructure has been badly scarred by the 1975–90 civil war. after the war the water and sanitation infrastructure was rebuilt with substantial external financial assistance. in south lebanon, which remained under israeli occupation until 2000, the infrastructure was gradually rebuilt as the israeli army withdrew. compared to the substantial investment in infrastructure, little effort was made at building the capacity of sector institutions and at establishing policies that favor the sustainability and improve the quality of services provided. also, wastewater treatment was neglected in terms of investments compared to water supply and sewerage. untreated wastewater was thus discharged to the sea and to rivers. no efforts were made to conserve water. still today, lebanon is one of the few countries in the middle east that has almost no water meters. institutional weaknesses and lack of sustainability al-ghadir wasterwater treatment plant in 2021 external financing institutions were concerned with the insufficient capacity to operate and maintain the infrastructure they were financing in lebanon. until 2000 there were 21 water authorities in lebanon who were financially and technically weak. the limited sewer networks, if they existed at all, were managed by the respective municipalities, which had often even less technical and financial capacity than the water authorities. in the absence of a sanitation tariff, municipalities lacked the financial resources to operate and maintain sanitation infrastructure. the experience with wastewater treatment plants is illustrative of the difficulties encountered. for example, the operating costs for the first wastewater treatment plant in lebanon, the al-ghadir plant in beirut completed in 1997, still have to be subsidized by the government because the municipal governments in the service area (the beirut and baabda districts) lack the resources to do so. furthermore, incomplete infrastructure considerably reduces the development impact of the plant. because the construction of sewers was delayed, most of the sewage of southern beirut still flowed into the mediterranean without any treatment via both the al ghadir river and sea outlets. the al ghadir plant provides only preliminary treatment, followed by discharge through a 2.6 km marine outfall. the al-ghadir wastewater treatment plant is located 7km to the south of beirut rafic hariri international airport. the service area of the plant covers the governorates of beirut and mount lebanon including beirut's southern suburb and around quarter the area of beirut in addition to parts of the districts of chouf, aley, and baabda. the second wastewater treatment plant built in lebanon, intended for the city of baalbek and completed in 2001, could not be put into operation, because both the sewer system and the outfall main were not completed. wastewater treatment plants in tripoli and sidon were inaugurated in 2009 and 2010 respectively, both long after they were due to be completed. sector reform at the national level, policy-making was fragmented between the ministry of energy and water in charge of drinking water supply and the ministry of interior in charge of sanitation, as well as other stakeholders such as the ministry of finance and the ministry of environment. the donors thus pressed for a sector reform that would create commercially oriented regional water and sanitation companies that would achieve economies of scale. in 2000 a new water law was passed that created four regional water establishments. however, the transfer of actual responsibilities to them remained slow and the water authorities continued to remain in charge of operating infrastructure. the council for development and reconstruction (cdr) also remained in charge of procuring works and consulting contracts, including service contracts to operate infrastructure despite the responsibilities bestowed on the new establishments under the water law. according to a 2010 world bank ten years after the water law has been passed it "has not been fully enforced and implemented, thus creating institutional uncertainty over sector responsibilities". furthermore, "the four rwes severely lack managerial and financial autonomy and are impeded by limited inter-agency coordination and weak central government oversight. they have not been able to effectively operate and maintain water supply networks, fully engage with the private sector, recover costs and hire qualified staff". private sector participation in the city of tripoli a private french company managed the water supply between 2003 and 2007 under a management contract. in 2003 the municipality of tripoli signed the first and so far only management contract for water supply in lebanon. this was done after four years of preparation that required passing a new law (law 401) to allow public-private partnerships in water supply. the contract was awarded to the french company ondéo-liban, a subsidiary of suez environnement, after a competitive bidding process. the cost of 20 million euro was financed by the french development agency. the contract included the operation, maintenance, and installation of equipment, the organization of the billing system and collection of water tariffs, the management of human and financial resources, and the supervision of the construction of a tertiary water supply network and the expansion of a water treatment plant. the private company increased the billing efficiency from 30% to 60%, reduced water rationing, mapped the network, updated the customer inventory, computerized the accounting system and trained staff. non-revenue water was reduced from 65% to 45% and the 10-year-long water rationing in the areas of qalamoun, qobbe and abi samra was eliminated, making tripoli the only city in lebanon that receives water 24 hours per day. water quality and the customer service were also improved. however, cost recovery was not achieved despite an increase in tariffs because bill collection efficiency remained low. the company was unable to introduce metering, although 40,000 meters were acquired. the contract faced a number of challenges: according to a study by the french institute for public-private partnerships, the supervisory committee was composed of former employees of the public water company who were not convinced of the usefulness of private sector participation. despite its achievements, the management contract ended in 2007 without being extended. impact of 2006 war water infrastructure, especially in the south, was further damaged during the israeli-lebanese war of 2006. israeli armed forces "destroyed water tanks, springs and pipelines, leaving most of southern lebanon totally cut off from mains water supply in the immediate aftermath of the war", according to un sources. the infrastructure was rebuilt after the war, partly by hizbollah's construction company jihad al-bina. foreign donors also played an important role in reconstruction, including unicef and technisches hilfswerk from germany. impact of syrian civil war the syrian civil war has exacerbated lebanon's water stress, as syrian refugees have expanded lebanon's population by a quarter. humanitarian actors have sought to improve water infrastructure, but coordinated longer-term efforts will be needed to meet current needs and guard against water crises in the future. 2021 unicef report in july 2021, unicef reported that water supply system in lebanon is on the verge of total collapse, due to shortages in funding, fuel and other supplies such as chlorine and spare parts. responsibility for water supply and sanitation among the key public stakeholders in the lebanese water and sanitation sector are the ministry of water and energy, which is in charge of policy and regulation; the ministry of finance, which provides funding and coordinates external cooperation; the ministry of environment; the council for development and reconstruction, which is in charge of most investments in the sector; and four regional water establishments, which are in charge of service provision. the sector is characterized by a significant gap between legal responsibilities of stakeholders and their actual activities. the legal text to organize the work of mew has not been developed as of 2012. mew's efforts are still dedicated to investment projects and not on policy and regulation. the ministry still has units dedicated to investment studies, although these functions should have been transferred to the water establishments. policy and regulation: the ministry of water and energy within the lebanese government the ministry of water and energy is in charge of developing and implementing policies related to water supply and sanitation. as of 2010, there was no specific policy or strategy document outlining the government's policy in the sector. the ministry seems to focus on energy and to pay less attention to water, not to speak of sanitation. the legal framework consists of the water law 221/2000 that reorganized the sector into four regional water establishments. the law was amended twice shortly after it was passed: law 241/2000 reduced the number of regional water establishments from 5 to 4; and law 337/2001 included wastewater treatment in the responsibilities of the regional water establishments and of the ministry of water and energy. in october 2005 some bylaws for the aforementioned laws were published. service provision: the four regional water establishments map showing the six governorates of lebanon. the two governorates of beirut and mount lebanon (center of the map) form a single regional water establishment, as do the governorate of nabatiye in the south-east and the southern governorate. the boundaries of the governorates of beqaa in the east and of the northern governorate correspond to the boundaries of the respective regional water establishments. provision of drinking water supply and wastewater treatment is the responsibility of the four regional water establishments that were created by the 2000 water law: water of beirut and mount lebanon – head office in beirut. water of north lebanon – head office in tripoli. water of bekaa – head office in zahle. water of south lebanon – head office in sidon (saida). although the establishments are legally responsible for irrigation and wastewater treatment, they are not engaged in these activities. there is no strategic or business planning, nor a focus on performance. there is a limited focus on it and on asset management; customer service is fragmented. by law lebanese water utilities should have 4,050 employees, but they actually had only 1,342 as of 2010. this is due to a hiring freeze imposed by the government. the number of employees has thus declined during the first decade of the 21st