Nigeria: U.S. $79 Million for Water And Sanitation in Rural Areas

10 October 2007
African Development Bank (Abidjan)

Tunis — The Board of Directors of the African Development Fund (ADF), the soft-loan arm of the African Development Bank Group (AfDB), approved on Wednesday in Tunis a loan of 51 million Units of Account (USD 79.4 million or 9.9 billion Naira) to finance an important rural water supply and sanitation in Nigeria.

The project aims to improve the social well being and health of the people in Yobe and Osun States towards poverty eradication through the sustainable development of WSS facilities. It will provide adequate and safe water and sanitation service to the rural population in Nigeria and strengthen sector capacity for programme implementation and effective operation and maintenance.

The project will increase water coverage in the two considered states to 100% by 2015 from the current level of 46.40% in Yobe and 44.72 in Osun.

Sanitation coverage will increase to 90% by 2015 as against 33.60% in Yobe and 29.20% in Osun actually.

Among its socio-economic impacts, the project will lower infant mortality rate from 110.6 per 1000 to 30.3 per 1000 in 2015. Under 5 mortality rate will also decrease from 193.6 to 63.7 in 2015. Primary school enrolment will increase from 67.7% to 100% in 2015. The average distance to the nearest water point will be reduced from 15 km to less than 500 m by 2012. Per capita basic water consumption will increase from 15 l per capita per day to 20 l/c/d by 2012.

The target population is 3.32 million for water facilities and 2.98 million for sanitation services. The sub-programmes will thus contribute up to 3.60% to the national targets with regards to safe water supply in line with MDGs. Its contribution to the national sanitation target is estimated at 3.23 %.

The project falls within the framework of NigeriaÂ's Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Programme, developed through financial assistance from the AfDB. NigeriaÂ's RWSS Programme includes investment sub-programmes for the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The Bank intervention under ADF 10 (2005-2007) targets the two states of Yobe and Osun.

Nigeria has a population of about 140 million (2005) with 70.30 million (52.2%), living in rural areas.

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