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The establishment of dedicated regulatory bodies in charge of regulating water services, whilst being recent, is nevertheless a consistent trend among OECD and non-OECD countries. This report presents a picture as of September 2014 of the governance arrangements, operational modalities and use of regulatory tools across a sample of 34 established water regulators. It relies on the OECD Best Practice Principles for Regulatory Policy: The Governance of Regulators to structure the information collected through a survey exercise. It has been developed in close co-operation with the OECD Network of Economic Regulators (NER).
The results from the survey show that the 34 water regulators show generally a high level of adoption of good governance principles and practices. They display functions and powers that are in line with their objectives. Water regulators also show a strong culture of consultation. Other areas, in particular evaluation of regulatory impacts, could be further strengthened.
This report is part of a project of the Regulatory Policy Committee (RPC) on Applying Better Regulation for the Water Sector, which contributes to the OECD project on Water Policies for Future Cities. It has been developed in close co-operation with the water regulators of the OECD Network of Economic Regulators (NER).
This report describes the governance arrangements, operational modalities and use of regulatory tools across a sample of 34 bodies responsible for regulating the provision of drinking water and wastewater services [hereafter referred to as water regulators], based on the OECD Best Practice Principles for Regulatory Policy: The Governance of Regulators.
This chapter provides key insights into the governance of water regulators based on the answers provided by 34 regulators to the OECD survey. In particular, the Chapter describes for this sample of regulators their: 1) institutional setting; 2) mandates, roles and core regulatory functions; 3) internal organisation; 4) accountability mechanisms; 5) use of tools and mechanisms to ensure regulatory quality.
Countries regulate the provision of water services in different ways. There is a large literature that reviews the different regulatory models in use globally. While a detailed description of these models is outside the scope of this report, this chapter focuses on describing the main regulatory models for water services. It identifies the establishment of dedicated regulatory bodies as a growing trend among countries and sheds some light on the motivations behind this trend.