Public-Private Partnerships for the Urban Environment: Options and Issues

Cities around the world are growing at an unprecedented rate. Over the past three
decades, the number of people living in the cities of developing countries has more than
tripled. This urban growth continues to be accompanied by an alarming increase in the
number of people living in poverty. Today, one out of four people living in cities does so in
absolute poverty; another one in four is classified as relatively poor.

The rapid concentration of hundreds of millions of people in urban areas has placed an
extraordinary strain on governments – both national and local – to meet their citizens’ basic
needs. Many governments are finding that their existing water, sanitation, and energy
infrastructures are unable to service their rapidly expanding populations. In addition,
governments realise that their limited financial resources are not sufficient to cover the needed expansion of these services. Even where governments do find the resources to subsidize
public utilities, service is often still poor and sectors of the population largely unserved.