Learning From the Millennium Drought: Anna Jackson of SA Water
The Mount Bold Reservoir, just southeast of Adelaide.
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A Water has been supplying water to the people of the Australian state of South Australia for over 150 years. South Australia’s 1.7 million residents are spread across an area more than twice the size of California, meaning that SA Water’s infrastructure is extremely extensive, reaching into remote zones. The Millennium Drought of the early to mid2000s has pushed SA Water and its customers to become more water efficient and to develop alternate water sources, including desalination plants. In this interview, Anna Jackson, the general manager for customers, strategy, and innovation at SA Water, speaks with Irrigation Leader Editor-in-Chief Kris Polly and with Catrin Moller of SA Water, who completed a brief internship with Water Strategies this year, about SA Water’s current challenges and achievements. Catrin Moller: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position.
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Catrin Moller: Please tell us about SA Water. Anna Jackson: SA Water is an interesting organization that is similar to only one other Australian water utility— the one in Western Australia—in terms of governance, remit, and size. It is a publicly owned water corporation, which means that it is designed to be a commercial operation while being owned by the government of South Australia. It has an independent board reporting to the minister for environment and water. We have to look at things in both a commercial and a social light because of this arrangement—it’s really important that we get that balance right all the time. We work closely with the government to make sure that we can provide water and wastewater services for as many South Australians as possible. We have 700,000 residential and business connections in South Australia. There are 1.7 million people in South Australia. Some South Australians receive water through smaller organizations or councils, but SA
PHOTOS COURTESY OF SA WATER.
Anna Jackson: Twenty-five years ago, when I started working for the Australian national broadcaster as a journalist, it never occurred to me that I would end up in the water industry. Growing up in Adelaide, I just turned on the tap and expected water to come out and flushed the toilet and expected everything to go away, as I think most people do. Then I worked in politics, public affairs, and government advocacy for a long time. I transferred into the private sector, working on emerging markets, and that
morphed into international development, which brought me to work in Washington, DC, including with a U.S. company called Tetra Tech International. I ended up at SA Water, attracted by the provision of essential services. Whether you are working in international development or human rights management, water and wastewater management is important for every single thing that you do.
