Overview and assessment of rural water supply programs and projects in Thailand (1987-1993)

Despite the great expectations of the Water Decade (1980s), more than 30 per cent of the Asian population lacks access to safe drinking water and this problem has remained intractable well into the 1990s. Since the 1960s, the Royal Thai Government (RTG) has been committed to the development of small-scale water resource projects to provide safe drinking and adequate domestic water to the rural population. However, questions have been raised about the central coordination mechanism for all these projects as overlapping has become apparent in small-scale water resources development. The objectives of this study are: to investigate how rural water supply programmes and projects in Thailand have been implemented; to determine the contribution of foreign-assisted projects to the overall rural water supply programme; and to assess whether the small-scale rural water supply activities, both RTG-funded and foreign-funded, are complementary or overlapping, and if overlapping, to determine why and to recommend measures to prevent duplication. The results of the study, covering the period 1987-1991, are included in this report as well as a reckoning of the financial costs involved and an analysis of institutional strengths and weaknesses. The bulk of the study consists of annexes presenting summary data on RTG-funded rural water supply activities (1987-1993), a compendium of foreign-funded rural water supply projects (1987-1993), and a compendium of other foreign-funded small water resource development projects (1987-1993). The study concludes that despite the political will to solve water shortage problems and a huge outlay of funds, the problem situation has not been alleviated at all due to planning and implementation failures and the lack of a cohesive and coordinated "programme".