History and Recent Developments
The history of the water supply and sanitation sector since the end of Apartheid has been characterized by a strong government commitment to increase access to services and a gradual reduction of the role of Water Boards and the national government in service provision. There has also been a tension between the goal of increased cost recovery enshrined in the 1997 Water Services Act on the one hand, and the constitutional right to access to water introduced in 1996 and the policy of free basic water introduced in 2001 on the other hand. There have been a number of controversies on policies in the sectors, including about private sector participation, which was introduced in the mid-1990s, the practice of cutting off water or installing flow restrictors for those who do not pay their bills, and the installation of pre-paid meters.
Read more about this topic: Water Supply And Sanitation In South Africa
Famous quotes containing the words history and/or developments:
“A great proportion of the inhabitants of the Cape are always thus abroad about their teaming on some ocean highway or other, and the history of one of their ordinary trips would cast the Argonautic expedition into the shade.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The developments in the North were those loosely embraced in the term modernization and included urbanization, industrialization, and mechanization. While those changes went forward apace, the antebellum South changed comparatively little, clinging to its rural, agricultural, labor-intensive economy and its traditional folk culture.”
—C. Vann Woodward (b. 1908)