The Performance Measurement Initiative of PMU in Water Services
Introduction: Indicators are characteristic parameters that describe a status (operational, financial, technical etc) of an entity or process based on measuring the variables that define an indicator. The emphasis lies on measuring, meaning that judgment is based on verifiable facts and not subject to individual impressions. As such, and if measured periodically, the indicators show a measured development trend.
The Water Authority of Jordan (WAJ) has identified performance measurement as a key component of its drive to increase transparency and accountability in the water services in Jordan.
The Performance Indicator Initiative for Water Services was launched in July 2005 with an initiation workshop, bringing together the major stakeholders of this task. Since this time PMU has received feed-back from LEMA (Management Contract Greater Amman), the Aqaba Water Company (AWC), Balqa and Tafieleh Governorate Administrations.
The current set of indicators incorporate the WAJ key indicators / variables, which are:
- Number of staff per 1000 subscribers
- Non-revenue water as % of system input
- Cash collected as % of billed
- Operation cost recovery
- Water quality compliance with standards
Indicators are a tool and not a solution.
As such they have no statistical value unless they are analyzed and can thus contribute to a better understanding of prevailing situations and circumstances.
They should point to the cause of problems, facilitate development of improvement measures and indicate, over time, the effect of the measures undertaken.
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Indicators are a tool and not a solution.
As such they have no statistical value unless they are analyzed and can thus contribute to a better understanding of prevailing situations and circumstances.
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The Jordanian Context
Even though being one of the most water scarce-countries in the world, almost the entire population (service coverage 97%) has access to piped water supply services. The related figures for wastewater services are 60%. These figures are outstanding in the developing world, showing the extraordinary commitment of the Government towards health concerns.
Jordan, however, is a country with one of the highest population growth rates, a situation which has been further aggravated periodically by a high influx of people from surrounding military conflicts. Retaining the coverage of the services or even expanding it carries the burden of the ever higher costs of narrowing the gap between demand and availability of resources.
Being caught between these two positions, increasing of the effectiveness of service provision and cautious use of water, is unavoidable. Recent investigations have shown that there are several possibilities for improvement that will help ease the situation, thus postponing decisions to implement very costly new developments.
Introduction of Performance Indicators (PIs) is accepted as a useful management tool for measuring the efforts of the utilities towards more effective operation of the facilities, while maintaining or even increasing the quality of services. With applying and monitoring the right PIs, we get a better insight into prevailing problems, and one that points more clearly in the direction of particular remedial actions.
Applicability of the IWA PIs
In appreciating the worldwide problems, and in order also to provide the means for international comparison and sharing of improvement efforts, the International Water Association (IWA) has come up with an extensive set of 138 Performance Indicators grouped into the following main categories:
- Water resources
- Personnel (of the utility)
- Physical components
- Operational aspects
- Quality of services
- Financial aspects
The IWA set of indicators was subject to a relatively broad opinion poll among WAJ officials. This poll asked for judgments as to whether the individual indicators seem to be the right ones to describe the current services, and whether the means are available to provide the reliable measurement data necessary for the indicators. The evaluation of this poll led to a revised set of 93, partly modified, indicators, which were in the last screening in March 2006 further reduced to 52 with 70 variables. Click here[K1] to download the current set of variables and indicators.
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IWA Categories / Number of Indicators
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Water Resources
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Personnel
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Physical
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Operational
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Quality of Services
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Financial
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TOTAL
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IWA 2000
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2
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22
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12
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36
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29
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37
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138
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WAJ/PMU Pilot Areas
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Importance Level 1
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1
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1
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2
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1
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6
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4
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15
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Importance Level 2
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2
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2
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0
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10
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4
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0
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18
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Importance Level 3
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0
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7
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1
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8
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2
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1
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19
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TOTAL
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3
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10
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3
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19
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12
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5
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52
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Establishment of service standards and benchmarks
Benchmarking is a useful tool to measure performance development of a utility relative to other utilities (e.g. “best practices”), and can be used to identify problems. It can also be used to justify those performance targets a regulator would like to see realized by utilities. Service standards are standards that have been fixed and that are to be achieved by a utility. With the further development of the monitoring and reporting concepts, and an increasing WSAU role, a review could be made of existing service standards and how to include the standards in the monitoring and reporting exercise
Example of KPIs outcome for evaluation and comparison
- WR01, Inefficiency of use of water resources Measures the proportion of water lost through Real Losses (ie Leakage)
- PHc04, Bulk meter coverage Measures the availability and serviceability of production meters.
3. OPc04, Real Losses per km Measures Real Losses per km of network
