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Opportunities and Challenges for Small Scale Private Service Providers in Electricity and Water Supply : Evidence from Bangladesh, Cambodia, Kenya, and the Philippines


Many developing countries are falling short on delivering basic infrastructure services to their populations. An estimated 1 billion people are without safe water, and 1.6 billion are without electricity. The poor, who have limited resources and often live in remote areas, peri-urban neighborhoods, or crowded slums, are most affected by the lack of clean, safe, reliable, and affordable services. This chapter provides an overview of small scale providers based on the literature, and presents a framework for the analysis of Small Scale Private Service Providers (SPSP). Chapter two looks at the issues in the electricity sector particularly related to mini-grids and battery charging station (BCS) from the four-country survey. Chapter three provides an analysis of small private water networks, and chapter four analyzes SPSP of point source and mobile water service. Chapters two, three, and four are structured similarly and discuss the prevalence and role of SPSP in each of the subsectors, key characteristics of the SPSP, performance and service standards, their financial situation, challenges and constraints, and future prospects. Some differences in the data, country coverage, and sectoral contexts require variation in approach. Chapter five concludes with a summary of key findings, discusses the opportunities and challenges for SPSP in the delivery of water and electricity, and presents a set of emerging policy issues for countries with substantial SPSP presence to consider.

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