Is Low Coverage of Modern Infrastructure Services in African Cities due to Lack of Demand or Lack of Supply?
A majority of sub-Saharan Africa s population is not connected to electricity and piped water networks, and even in urban areas coverage is low. Lack of network coverage may be due to demand or supply-side factors. Some households may live in area...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Policy Research Working Paper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2012
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/main?menuPK=64187510&pagePK=64193027&piPK=64187937&theSitePK=523679&menuPK=64187510&searchMenuPK=64187283&siteName=WDS&entityID=000158349_20090327144908 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/4075 |
| Summary: | A majority of sub-Saharan Africa s
population is not connected to electricity and piped water
networks, and even in urban areas coverage is low. Lack of
network coverage may be due to demand or supply-side
factors. Some households may live in areas where access to
piped water and electricity is feasible, but may not be able
to pay for those services. Other households may be able to
afford the services, but may live too far from the electric
line or water pipe to have a choice to be connected to it.
Given that the policy options for dealing with demand as
opposed to supply-side issues are fairly different, it is
important to try to measure the contributions of both types
of factors in preventing better coverage of infrastructure
services in the population. This paper shows how this can be
done empirically using household survey data and provides
results on the magnitude of both types of factors in
explaining the coverage deficit of piped water and
electricity services in urban areas for a large sample of
African countries. |
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