Abstract
The development and expansion of water infrastructure have been a fundamental requirement of urbanization since the mid-nineteenth century. As urban areas have grown, the protection of water resources, the collection, and treatment of wastewater and rainwater from urban areas have become as significant as potable water supply. Urban water as a public service provided by the municipalities in Turkey. Water management in Turkey moved away from the public service approach under regulatory changes enacted after 1980 as an extension of worldwide neoliberal policies. The prerequisites of obtaining credit other than from public resources, and specifically through international organizations, and technical assistance, have led to structural changes in water management at the central and local levels. This article discusses the structural change in water management as part of the integration of the national economy with global capital between 1980 and 2000 and within the framework of local economies becoming integrated with global capital after 2000. In 1981, the first arrangement was made for the commercialization of water services with the Water and Canal Administration, the model prerequisite of the World Bank infrastructure loan for the metropolitan city of Istanbul. In 1986, water and sewerage administrations (Su ve Kanal İdareleri-SKİs-) were founded under all greater city municipalities as organizations with an independent budget and public legal entity. After 2000, with the adoption of the EU Water Framework Directive, new institutional arrangements were made, watershed management and provincial water management were established, and the commodification of water and the environment continued under environmental legislation. Today, SKİs are strong actors in water management that provide rural and urban water services in Turkey’s 30 provinces. However, after the rescaling made by overlapping the metropolitan boundaries with the provincial boundaries, the operational efficiency of SKIs and the affordability of water service by user was opened up to discussion.
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Notes
- 1.
Article 23-Amended: 5/6/1986 – 3305/2 art.
- 2.
In 1993, the Bursa Water and Environmental Health Project (Official Gazette dated July 4, 1993 issue 21627) was carried out with a loan agreement with the World Bank. Bursa Solid Waste Loan 3566-TU and Bursa Water and Sanitation Project Loan 3565-TU.
- 3.
Twinning is a technical assistance contract between the water administration and the consortium formed by international consultants and an international operator favorably viewed in its field.
- 4.
Under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) of 1994, water services were no longer classed as public services, and water and water-related services were treated as a market commodity that could be bought and sold on the global marketplace like other goods and services.
- 5.
With the end of the UN Millennium Development Goals period in 2015, they were replaced by the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) under Agenda 2030. SDG 6 is on “Ensur[ing] availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all” and emphasizes the rising importance of water and sanitation conditions on the global political agenda.
- 6.
This approach based on the watershed level governance model was realized under the 7th Environmental Action Plan (2012–2020) dealing with EU acquis chapters Regional Policy and Coordination of Structural Instruments (Chap. 22) and the Environment (Chap. 27).
- 7.
The Directorate General of State Hydraulic Works, an important national investor organization in the supply of drinking and irrigation water, was established under Law 6200 of 1953. With the transition to a presidential government system in Turkey in 2018, the central administration responsible for water was restructured. Statuary Decree 703 repealed the Statuary Decree 645 on the Organization and Duties of the Ministry of Forestry and Hydraulic Works dated June 29, 2011. Under Presidential Decree 1 on the Organisation of the Presidential Structure dated July 10, 2018, the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry was established. The general directorates of Water Management, which has watershed-based water management tasks, and the State Hydraulic Works were placed under this ministry as part of the restructuring.
- 8.
The Mersin Water and Sewerage Administration (MESKİ) can be given as an example of the rescaling of service areas. Mersin Municipality became a greater city municipality in 1993 and, in the same year, MESKİ was established by a decision of the Council of Ministers. In 2004, under Law 5216 on Greater City Municipalities, 19 municipalities and 47 villages were included within MESKİ’s service area. As a result of this change, MESKİ’s responsibilities extended to 296 settlement units in total, including neighborhoods and villages, spread across an area of 650 km2. On March 30th, 2014, MESKİ’s service area was extended to cover the whole province. Four central districts, as well as nine outlying district municipalities, additionally 509 villages and 41 towns that had lost their legal entity status and become neighborhoods, included in the MESKİ service area. Following this change, the service area of MESKİ’s increased from 650 to 15,512 km2, a multiple of almost 24. The number of water utility subscribers doubled from 348,494 (in 2013) to 724,602 (in 2014) (MESKİ, 2020). Despite the large increase in the service area, the increase in the number of subscribers was limited.
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Tamer, N.G. (2021). Regulation of Domestic Water in the Framework of Provincial Greater City Municipality Water and Sewerage Administrations. In: Eroğlu, M., Finger, M. (eds) The Regulation of Turkish Network Industries. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-81720-6_8
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