The water and sanitation sector in Peru has made important advances in the last two decades, including the increase of water coverage from 30% to 85% between 1980 and 2010. Sanitation coverage has also increased from 9% to 37% from 1985 to 2010 in rural areas. Advances have also been achieved concerning the disinfection of drinking water and in sewage treatment. Nevertheless, many challenges remain, such as: Insufficient service coverage; Poor service quality which puts the population's health at risk; Deficient sustainability of built systems; Tariffs that do not cover the investment and operational costs, as well as the maintenance of services; Institutional and financial weakness; and, Excess of human resources, poorly qualified, and high staff turnover.

Access

Access to water and sanitation increased during the last decades. Political efforts to increase access include the program Agua para todos which started in 2006 under President Alan García (see below).

Joint Monitoring Program

According to the Joint Monitoring Program (JMP) by WHO and UNICEF the coverage of improved drinking water service was 85% and 71% had access to improved sanitation in 2010. Access increased from 75% concerning water and 54% concerning sanitation in 1990. In 2010, urban coverage was 91% for water and 81% for sanitation. In rural areas coverage of drinking water was 65% and sanitation 37%.

Access to Water and Sanitation in Peru (2010) Urban(77% of the population) Rural (23% of the population) TotalWater Total Improved 91% 65% 85% Piped on premises 83% 46% 74%Sanitation Improved sanitation 81% 37% 71% Shared 9% 3% 8% Open defecation 1% 28% 7%

National figures

According to the Peruvian National Statistics and Informatic Institute (Instituto Nacional de Estadística e Informática - INEI), about 73% of the population had access to drinking water supply in 2009, while about 57% had access to sewerage., p. 78 In the framework of the development plan Plan Bicentenario it is envisaged to increase water supply coverage to 85% and access to sewerage to 79% by 2021., p. 56

Social access Parts of Peru are located in vast deserts, limiting water accessibility. While there has been an emphasis within the country on improving infrastructure to increase water access and restore watersheds, much of Peru still remains under-served, with over 1.5 million people estimated to have no running water in their homes. A 2015 UN Water Global Analysis and Assessment of Sanitation and Drinking Water report stated that Peru has made significant improvements within the last fifteen years to promote sanitation and improve access to water. Water access, however, is still unequal; some Peruvians pay 1.3 sols (.40 USD) for one cubic meter of running water, while poorer citizens who rely on water delivery trucks to bring them their resources pay around 20 sols ($6 USD) for one cubic meter of running water, an over 1500% increase. Water delivered in Peru tends to be unsanitary and non-potable. However, wealthier citizens are more easily able to treat water in their homes, while poorer citizens often lack the resources to properly treat their water.

Service quality

In a national survey conducted in 2008, 64% of respondents indicated that they were satisfied with the quality of the water they received. Those who were not satisfied complained about turbidity, high levels of chlorine, bad taste and bad smell. This figure apparently does not include the level of satisfaction related to the continuity or pressure of water supply.

Continuity of water service

Urban areas received water service for an average of 17 hours per day in 2005. Only one Peruvian service company has continuous service, the company EMSAP in the Amazon region. SUNASS gráficos promedio 1

Back in 1997, the total continuity average was at 12 hours per day, 5 hours less than in 2005. Rural areas averaged 18 hours, while in urban areas, service was provided on average for 12 hours. Service averaged 8 hours on the coast, 18 hours in forested and mountainous regions, and 10 hours in metropolitan Lima. Evaluation of Peru's National Sanitation Policies 2004

Disinfection

In 2000, 80% of urban water supply systems used disinfection measures. WHO/PAHO 2000 In urban areas, 43 companies that provided information to the regulator complied with the norms for residual chlorine in the network.

In rural areas, however, in a sample consisting of 1,630 analyzed systems, 59% do not disinfect the water because of lacking the necessary facilities or the lack of chlorine. Considering that locations with less than 2,000 inhabitants have around 11,800 systems, it can be estimated that around 7,000 rural water systems provide water without disinfection. National Housing and Water Plan 2006-2015, p. 76

Wastewater treatment

The share of treated wastewater in 2004 was estimated at 22%. This is to say that more than three fourths of the wastewater generated did not receive any type of treatment prior to its final discharge, which poses a serious threat to the environment. National Housing and Water Plan 2006-2015, p. 89 Back in 1997, the coverage of wastewater treatment had only been 13%. SUNASS: evolution of indicators, 2005 In 2005, only two companies treated all of their sewage, one of them being from the Provincia de Marañón.

The great majority of sewage of the Lima-Callao metropolitan area is discharged without treatment into the ocean, resulting in serious contamination of the surrounding beaches. The Japanese Bank of International Cooperation (JBIC) provided a loan for the sanitation of the Lima-Callao area in 1997.Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) - List of projects However, the project was not implemented.

In 2013 the Taboada wastewater treatment plant was commissioned in Lima. With a capacity of 1,8 million cubic meters/day it is the largest wastewater treatment plant in South America. It was privately financed as a Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) project by the Spanish firm Técnicas de Desalinización de Aguas (Tedagua). It is envisaged that some of the treated water will be used for the irrigation of urban parks. Financing for another wastewater treatment plant in La Atarjea has been secured in February 2014 through a 48,66 million Euro loan from the German development bank KfW. The treated waster will be reused for irrigation after being discharged into an existing irrigation canal.

Water resources and impact of climate change

On average, surface water in Peru is abundant. Nevertheless, it is unequally distributed in space and time. Especially the coastal area, where the country's major cities are located and two thirds of the population live, is very dry. Lima with 8 million people, is the world's second largest city located on a desert (after Cairo).

Peru contains over two-thirds of all tropical glaciers which provide important water sources for the dry western half of the country. These glaciers are rapidly melting as a result of climate change, making the flow of rivers more irregular, leading to more droughts and floods. A report by a team from the World Bank published in June 2007 in the bulletin of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) predicts that many of the lower glaciers in the Andes will be gone in the next decade or so, and that glacial runoff may dry up altogether within 20 years. The last comprehensive satellite survey by Peru's National Environmental Council, carried out in 1997, found that the area covered by glaciers had shrunk by 22% since the early 1960s. Partial surveys by geologists suggest that the rate at which the glaciers are melting has sped up over the past decade."When Ice turns to water", The Economist, July 12, 2007 Additionally, as these glaciers rapidly melt, they also expose the water to contaminants in the glaciers, such as lead and cadmium, making it unsafe to consume,

For example, the Quelccaya Ice Cap is the second largest in the Peruvian Andes and has shrunk by 30% in the last 33 years. Streams fed by glaciers and rainwater provide water further downstream.

Parts of Peru are in arid, dry desert-like conditions, which in turn have created a drought-like situation. As global temperatures increase, these areas are at higher risk of not obtaining steady access to water in already limited amounts. This is seen in Peru in the primarily Northern part of the country where there is much more desert-like conditions,

Sustainability Discussed in Treehugger magazine, there is a sustainability sweet spot, in which a nation has a high level of human development cross-checked with ecologically sustainable use of resources. Peru is one of the very few countries falling into this sweet spot. The sustainability methods of Peru is a relatively modern ideology that has not been thought about in the grand scheme of time. Peru is able to pursue a method of sustainability since it has a large amount of readily available natural resources, as opposed to other countries that rely heavily on imports for mass amounts of natural resources. It is also important to understand how sustainable Peru's future water resources will remain as climate change progresses and rapidly affects the water supply. For example, the Rimac, Chillon, and Lurin River are all central to Peru's water supply, and are not equipped to handle the growing population. As it stands, there are no current plans by the government to deal with this issue.

Sustainability generally refers to the capacity for earth's biosphere and human civilization to coexist. Sustainability is a vital aspect of the WASH sector in development because it conserves the environment, is cost friendly, and promotes healthier development practices. The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 committed the United States to sustainability, declaring it a national policy "to create and maintain conditions under which humans and nature can exist in productive harmony, that permit fulfilling the social, economic, and other requirements of present and future generations". Institutional sustainability in the WASH sector means that WASH systems, institutions, policies, and procedures at the local level are functional and meet the demand of users of WASH services. The element of environmental sustainability implies placing WASH interventions in the wider context of the natural environment and implementing an approach of integrated and sustainable management of water and waste(-water) flows and resources.

Water use In 2005, an average of 259 liters/person/day of water were produced in urban areas. Actual water consumption is much lower than this level due to distribution losses estimated around 45%. Per capita water production has decreased by 26% since 1997 when production was at 352 liters/person/day. This decrease may be partly due to an increase in the share of metered users from 24% to 47% (1997–2005). According to the National Sanitation Plan, it is inadmissible that with such high levels of production water supply remains intermittent in many cities.

In rural areas, water use is much lower than in urban areas.

According to a 2008 national survey by the radio station RPP and the World Bank's Water and Sanitation Program (WSP), 38% of respondents indicate that they "take great care" of water in the household. 89% of respondents indicated that they treat tap water before drinking it, primarily by boiling it, and 48% store water in their house because of intermittent supply or because they have no access to piped drinking water.Ministerio de Vivienda/JICA/JBIC/Grupo RPP/RPP Noticias/WSP:Construyendo una cultura del agua en el Perú . Estudio de perecepción sobre el agua y hábitos de consumo en la población, 2008, p. 10

History

Pre-colonial and colonial water infrastructure