Balancing consumption and availability in a multiple uses of water system

Water service provision in Colombia rural area Along with the unequal distribution of land and income, access to water service is uneven in the rural area compared to the urban area. Since 1994, Colombia adopted a model of decentralization in the provision of public services, allowing private sector participation. However, ensuring service provision remains as State responsibility. The private sector operates especially in cities (Foster, V., 2005) while in the rural areas the service is provided by local communal organizations, since this market is usually not attractive for private providers. Consequently, rural services commonly present weak operational and financial indicators, and provide water of deficient quality. Hence, while in 2004 access to water was 93% in urban areas, in rural areas it was 71% (World Bank, 2004). This figure includes nonconventional options and does not take into account quality and continuity, thus, it is expected that the actual coverage is lower (Rojas, 2008).....