page_title: Water supply and sanitation in Jordan
section_title: 1972-1994: Infrastructure Development, Institution Building and Regional Water Sharing
hierarchical_section_title: Water supply and sanitation in Jordan / Modern history and recent developments / 1972-1994: Infrastructure Development, Institution Building and Regional Water Sharing
caption_attribution_description: Tiberias English: Tiberias and the Sea of Galilee, Israel. עברית: הכנרת
context_page_description: Water supply and sanitation in Jordan is characterized by severe water scarcity, which has been exacerbated by forced immigration as a result of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, the Six-Day War in 1967, the Gulf War of 1990, the Iraq War of 2003 and the Syrian Civil War since 2011. Jordan is considered as one of the ten most water scarce countries in the world. High population growth, the depletion of groundwater reserves and the impacts of climate change are likely to aggravate the situation in the future.
  The country's major surface water resources, the Jordan River and the Yarmouk River, are shared with Israel and Syria who leave only a small amount for Jordan. The Disi Water Conveyance Project from the non-renewable Disi aquifer to the capital Amman, opened in July 2013, increases available resources by about 12%. It is planned to bridge the remaining gap between demand and supply through increased use of reclaimed water and desalinated sea water to be provided through the Red Sea-Dead Sea canal.
  Despite Jordan's severe water scarcity, more than 97% of Jordanians have access to an improved water source and 93% have access to improved sanitation.
context_section_description: From the early 1970s onwards the country's water infrastructure was expanded significantly with the construction of the King Talal Dam completed in 1977 and the completion of the East Ghor Canal (renamed King Abdullah Canal) in 1987. The country's first wastewater treatment plant at Ain Ghazal had been commissioned in 1968, but the construction of other wastewater treatment plants was addressed in only beginning in the late 1970s. In 1985, the largest wastewater treatment plant in the country was commissioned in As-Samra, serving Greater Amman. The plant used the stabilization pond technology, a natural technology that needed no electricity.
  In terms of institutions, the two autonomous water sector institutions created in the 1959 had been merged into the Natural Resources Authority in 1965, but this overly centralized arrangement including non-water functions such as mining did not prove to be successful. Therefore, in a further institutional shift, in 1973 three new organizations were created, each by its own law: The Amman Water and Sewer Authority (AWSA), the Drinking Water Supply Corporation (DWSC) in charge of water supply in the areas outside the capital, and the Jordan Valley Commission (JVC). In the meantime, Jordan's population had grown to 1.5 million because of natural growth and the influx of Palestinian refugees in 1967. The growing capital ran out of water and its supply became intermittent. In order to overcome the shortage, the Cabinet approved two projects in 1977: The first was the construction of a carrier from Deiralla in the Jordan Valley to pump drinking water to Amman, and the second was the construction of a carrier from the Azraq oasis east of the capital. Both projects were completed in the 1980s. At the same time, it was decided to reuse treated wastewater from Amman for irrigation in the Jordan Valley to compensate for the loss of freshwater.
  During this period a first National Water Master Plan was developed and finalized in 1977 with the assistance of the German government and its technical assistance agency GTZ.
  A separate water balance study was commissioned by the government at the time and was completed by Howard Humphrey and Partners in 1978. This study showed that water resources were greatly insufficient to achieve the country's goals for irrigation development and to provide its growing population with sufficient drinking water. On the basis of this study, Jordan approached the Iraqi government in order to explore the possibility to transfer water from the Euphrates to Jordan. The Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, who was closely allied with Jordan at the time, approved the request, but a feasibility study done in the mid-80s showed that the long-distance transfer would be prohibitively expensive. After abandoning this option, the government shifted its attention to the Disi Water Conveyance Project that would bring fossil groundwater from the border area with Saudi Arabia to Amman.
  In terms of institutional development, the government decided to return to the earlier structure of creating two separate autonomous agencies in charge of the water sector. In 1977, it created by law the Jordan Valley Authority (JVA) by merging the JVC and parts of other organizations, charging it with the comprehensive development of the Jordan Valley. In 1983, through another law it created the Water Authority of Jordan (WAJ), responsible for drinking water supply and sanitation in Jordan. Initially, the heads of both Authorities had the rank of Ministers and reported directly to the Prime Minister, until the Ministry of Water and Irrigation (MWI) was created in 1988 bringing the two agencies under it.
  Another institutional shift occurred in 1993 when a World Bank water sector review suggested to bring in a private company to run the water and sanitation system of Amman, a move that was endorsed by the government. An important motivation for this step was to increase cost recovery.
  In 1995, the Water Annex to the 1994 Israel–Jordan peace treaty increased Jordan's available water resources through the del
caption: Through the 1994 Peace Treaty with Israel, Jordan gained access to water from the Sea of Galilee.
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