Dhaka Prepares for Reduced Freshwater Availability Dhaka, Bangladesh

10%

NONREVENUE WATER

Inhabitants 17 million

GdP per capita $7,712

Geographic area 2,161 km²

ThE ChAllENGE

Access to clean water is a challenge for residents, who are often forced to rely on unreliable and expensive illegal water lines and private vendors.

CO-BENEFITs

health

The provision of a safe and reliable water supply will reduce water-related health risks, especially among children.

Economic

Piped water and metered connections will reduce the cost of water, with consumers no longer needing to pay high rates or water purification costs.

dhaka prepares for reduced freshwater availability

By improving the provision and reliability of dhaka’s water supply, the city also hopes to become more climate-resilient.

Providing sufficient drinking water is a challenge for the city of Dhaka, with 17 million residents and still growing by 3.6% annually. Climate change is expected to exacerbate threats to the city’s vulnerable water supply, with altered precipitation patterns, higher temperatures, sea level rise and salinization, river contamination, and increased pollution from flooding, all contributing to a decline in availability. These threats combined have necessitated the city to take urgent action.

Under the initiative, district metered areas will be expanded, more than 1,500 km of water distribution networks will be rehabilitated, and new technologies such as automated meter reading, supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA), and a water quality monitoring system, will be installed, effectively reducing nonrevenue water loss.

The construction of 9,500 new and legalized water points will also provide water at a lower cost for low-income communities and help Bangladesh’s largest city adapt to water uncertainties in a future under climate change.

The project is assisted by a $275 million loan from ADB.

Water supply network improvement. The project will build on previous efforts to improve piped water supply and reduce physical water losses in Dhaka (photo by Md. Arifur Rahman).