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In the ‘Year of Water,’ will the WASH sector take advantage of momentum?
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Hej from Stockholm! I’m here for World Water Week, the annual conference of government officials, financial institutions, businesses, researchers, and civil society to talk about all things WASH — or water, sanitation, and hygiene — along with water security.
The location could hardly be more fitting: The conference center overlooks the waterfront in a city built across 14 islands, where Lake Mälaren meets the Baltic Sea. The seafaring tradition is evident as kayaks and ferryboats sail through city waterways where Vikings once set off on their voyages. This marks the 35th year for the five-day global gathering, which is hosted by the Stockholm International Water Institute, or SIWI. The theme is “Water for People and Progress.” There’s a widespread feeling that this year is different, that there’s a rare momentum in a sector that, while fundamental to global development, has long been underinvested and overlooked. Many are calling 2026 the “Year of Water” — and the sector is riding a wave of global attention. First and foremost, there’s a race to accelerate action on Sustainable Development Goal 6 — clean water and sanitation for all — ahead of the United Nations Water Conference to be cohosted by the United Arab Emirates and Senegal in Abu Dhabi in December. Stockholm this week is seen as a pivotal moment where various players can meet, compare notes, and hone their projects and pledges ahead of December. Top of mind is a groundbreaking U.N. report in January showing that we have entered an era of “global water bankruptcy” in which water use in many basins and aquifers worldwide has exceeded renewable inflows and safe depletion limits — in some cases, beyond the chance for recovery. Nearly three-quarters of the world’s population lives in countries classified as water-insecure. Water is the foundation of the global economy — meaning that risks will naturally follow when water is under threat, the report’s author, Kaveh Madani, said at the opening ceremony today in Stockholm. “Water is also the foundation of stability in the world,” said Madani, director of the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health. “With what we have learned through COVID-19, the invasion of Ukraine, now the Iran war, the trade wars that are going on, is that the equilibria that the world relies on can be disrupted at any moment, and water plays a major role in keeping countries stable when it comes to employment and food production. So loss of water is a major unemployment issue, a migration issue, a national security issue.” A few thousand people are gathered this week for some 200 sessions, with topics including advancing gender equity in water services, addressing water scarcity as a business risk, improving cities’ “sponginess” to build climate resilience, and “water diplomacy” amid pressure on shared resources. Sessions on artificial intelligence examine how it can be used to crunch data for water monitoring and decision-making — while also taking into account AI data centers’ immense water usage and environmental impact. Another big question is how international finance can reach the communities that face the greatest water risks. One bright spot is that there are more business and finance representatives this year than ever before, SIWI Executive Director Helena Thybell tells me. Along with officials from a host of multilateral development banks are leaders from retailer Gap, Swedish manufacturing giant Alfa Laval, and Danish pump manufacturer Grundfos. Background reading: Water is life. But can it generate money? See also: Is there a market for water? Matt Damon says so, but investors are wary   Are you in Stockholm and want to speak with Devex? Come say hi! You can reach me at [email protected].
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Shifting tides
The stakes for the water sector — and the entire world — could hardly be higher.
“Water is treated as one issue amongst many. It isn’t. Water shapes our health, our food, our economies, our societies, our future,” Thybell said at the opening ceremony. “Many of the solutions are already known. The challenge is no longer knowing what to do. It is about doing it together.” There has been real progress in the past decade: More than 960 million people gained access to safely managed drinking water between 2015 and 2024, while 1.2 billion gained access to safe sanitation, according to U.N. figures. Yet 2.1 billion people globally still don’t have safely managed drinking water, and 3.4 billion lack safe sanitation. Women and girls, who are often responsible for collecting and managing water for their households, are disproportionately affected — and water scarcity associated with climate change is making it worse. A report last week by UNICEF and the World Health Organization on WASH in healthcare facilities worldwide found that while there has been progress since 2015, only 4 in 10 meet basic sanitation standards, and fewer than 6 in 10 meet basic environmental cleaning standards in patient wards, operating rooms, treatment areas, and toilets and sanitation facilities — potentially exposing patients and health workers to health risks. Meanwhile, water plays a key — though not always obvious — role in political, social, and economic goals. For example, policymakers and agribusinesses cheered when India overtook China as the world’s largest rice producer last year. But water experts are worried: The achievement with the water-intensive crop comes at the expense of India’s already low aquifers. Farmers are essentially borrowing against an uncertain future — drilling ever deeper bore wells as government subsidies encourage more rice cultivation. It’s obvious to those here that WASH is no longer just about building toilets and community wells. As climate change strains resources, water scarcity and sanitation breakdowns are sparking conflicts, mass migration, and health threats — particularly in fragile regions. “You see how the transformation [of the water agenda] has happened: from access, to efficiency, to security,” Bapon Fakhruddin, a water and climate leader at the Green Climate Fund, tells me. “And now we need to look at a more advanced stage, how we de-risk the ecosystems … so that water utilities have more opportunity to access financing, not only from the domestic side but also from the international or the [multilateral development banks] side.” GCF, for its part, has boosted its investments in water in recent years, viewing it as critical infrastructure for climate resilience and adaptation. The fund itself has invested more than $10.2 billion in water for people, planet, and food security, Fakhruddin says, while de-risking the market so that governments and the private sector will invest, too. “Together with cofinancing of $24 billion, that’s $34 billion mobilized into the market, supporting around 220 beneficiaries globally by 2030,” he says. Read more: Water and sanitation fall through the cracks of development Don’t miss this opinion: Water security failures risk hunger for billions. Countries must prepare A drop of hope There’s one thing putting wind in everybody’s sails: Water Forward, an ambitious World Bank-led initiative that aims to improve water access for 1 billion people by 2030. Multiple experts have described it to me as the most promising initiative in decades for attracting finance to the WASH sector and galvanizing political will around it. In Stockholm, it’s on everybody’s lips. “Now an opportunity has arrived. The onus is on the water industry to rise to that challenge,” Tim Wainwright, chief executive at WaterAid UK, tells me of the initiative. After all, “attention will move on, and we need to grasp this opportunity, make it work, make it resilient, make it sustainable, and make sure that it reaches everybody.” Water Forward launched in April during the World Bank and International Monetary Fund Spring Meetings. It frames water as an economic asset — not merely a social service expenditure. The bank’s own goal is to reach 400 million people. “There’s over 4 billion people who lack water security. So 400 million is just a drop,” says Sarah Nedolast, program manager of the Global Water Security and Sanitation Partnership at the World Bank. “So the only way that we can really make a big dent, we can make real progress, is working with others.” The bank has partnered with eight other MDBs, along with three other financial institutions: GCF, the OPEC Fund for International Development, and the International Fund for Agricultural Development. Central to the initiative are country “compacts,” in which governments analyze their own water resources and vulnerabilities, then decide their own priorities and how to allocate their capital. The initiative launched with 14 compacts and a goal to reach around 40 by the U.N. Water Conference in December, Nedolast says. The water sector requires a cumulative investment to the tune of $6.7 trillion by 2030. The majority of its funding comes from governments, while official development assistance, or ODA, accounts for about 6% and the private sector provides around 2%. “We all know ODA is not going up, and public budgets are constrained … so that 2% from the private sector is where we see a real opportunity,” Nedolast says. The task for the World Bank and its partners is to build up the “enabling environment” that attracts more finance, and to help countries create more “investable” opportunities — long a major challenge in a sector where many water service providers operate with low tariffs, weak billing systems, and high losses. Further, when the water sector does get funding, it leaves money on the table: 28 cents of every allocated dollar never gets spent, according to World Bank figures, because it’s so hard for countries and municipalities to translate investments into results. “First we need to get more water for the money that’s already there. How do we get more efficient and sustainable systems to deliver the services? How do we help our clients to get the policies and regulations in place? … Then we can think about getting more money for water,” Nedolast says. The private sector, she adds, won’t come on its own. Read more: The World Bank’s water shift See more: How can we finance WASH and water security?
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Don’t go chasing waterfalls
So far, there’s a clear message shining through in Stockholm: In a world where multilateralism is fraying amid endless geopolitical crises, the world has no choice but to join together on water governance. Madani, who is the former deputy vice president of Iran, is the guest of honor this week. He is the 2026 Stockholm Water Prize laureate, and will be celebrated Wednesday afternoon at the Stockholm City Hall. And despite his warning that we are living beyond our hydrological means, he is far from a mythological Cassandra. Those present in Stockholm are heeding his call. “Water is the common denominator in the world that is so fragmented because it’s the issue of the left, it’s also the issue of the right. It’s the issue of the south. It’s the issue of the north,” he said earlier today. “So we, as the water community, have a gift to give to this fragmented world and bring everyone to the table to make something that would benefit us all.” Read and watch: Why isn’t private investment flowing into water?
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Thank you for reading this special edition of the Newswire, edited by Fiona Zublin, copy edited by Florence Williams, and produced by Yula Mediavillo and Mariane Samson. Have a news tip? Email [email protected].
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