Water markets, demand, and cost recovery for piped water supply services
Subtitle: evidence from southwest Sri Lanka
By: Celine Nauges, Caroline van den Berg, no. WPS 3941 Collection Title:Policy, Research working paper.
Contributors: Van den Berg, Caroline.; World Bank.
Series: Policy research working paper -- 3941; Policy research working papers (Online) -- 3941.
Publisher: World Bank
Published: 2006
Place of publication: [Washington, D.C
Language: eng
Format: Electronic resource
Subjects: Water-supply -- Sri Lanka
Description: "In many countries water supply is a service that is seriously underpriced, especially for residential consumers.  This has led to a call for setting cost recovery policies to ensure that the tariffs charged for water supply cover the full cost of providing for the service.  Yet, the question arises on how consumers will react to such price increases.  The authors illustrate the impact of price increases on consumption of piped water through a study of the demand for water of piped and non-piped households using cross-sectional data from 1,800 households in Southwest Sri Lanka.  The (marginal) price elasticity is estimated at -0.74 for households exclusively relying on piped water, and at -0.69 for households using piped water but supplementing their supply with other water sources, with no significant differences between income groups.  Those households that depend on non-piped water sources have a time cost elasticity (as a proxy for price elasticity) of only -0.06.  The authors discuss the implications of these results in terms of pricing policy.   "--World Bank web site.
Notes: Title from PDF file as viewed on 8/30/2006.

Includes bibliographical references.

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