Performance assessment as a management tool for water utilities in developing countries. Case study at EMCALI-Colombia

摘要

Empresas Municipales de Cali (Emcali) provides public services, including telecommunications, electric power, public lighting and waterworks for Cali, Colombia. During the last years, the company has been in a very hard financial situation that almost brought it to liquidation. Right now, EMCALI is under the Superintendent of Public Services and a board of banks delegates control that had agreed to restructure the company's debt. This change in the director's board brings to EMCALI a new business perspective, focused in the development of modern management tools for each business unit. This paper presents the process that was initiated by EMCALI's Water Supply and Waste Water Business Unit (WSWW BU), to define and implement a performance indicators system that allows a better understanding of current situation of the WSWW BU. Is important to note that the system the WSWW BU attends is the third biggest system in Colombia. This system has more than 480 000 active customers, and 2 560 km of pipes. Another fact to be considered is that the Water Undertakings have to report only a very limited set of Pis that are later reviewed by the Superintendent of Public Services, which focus on financial aspects of the industry; consequently, the use of more detailed or industry specific PI system is not usual in Colombia. In this paper, the authors present the methodology used to develop and implement a PI system based on the IWA PI framework that accounts facts like: lack of information, limited human resources, low data reliability and accuracy. Additionally, it discusses the difficulties and lessons learned during the process and the first results interpretation.