The News Review:

- World Bank Funds Improved Water Supply for Malawi’s Urban Areas.
- Preparations under way for $800m urban water initiative in Malawi
- China drought hits water supplies to 1.6 million

World Bank Funds Improved Water Supply for Malawi’s Urban Areas.
Free with registration – M2 Presswire – AccessMyLibrary.com – May 25, 2007
5million is a grant and US$22. 5million a credit*. The project aims to increase access to sustainable water supply and sanitation services for people living in cities, towns, market centres, and villages and improve water resources management at the national level. The project will also contribute to building sector capacity through improved monitoring, regulation, incentive structures, public private partnerships, and coordination among the sector stakeholders.

Preparations under way for $800m urban water initiative in Malawi
Engineering News (press release) – May 25, 2007
The problem is that,though the population has increased, water supply has remained thesame,” says Gondwe. He says the experts from the World Bank and the EuropeanDevelopment Bank went around the country in order to establish theareas that the project will tackle. So far, the defined works for the urban water-supply projectinclude the rehabilitation of water-treatment plants, transmissionmains, storage tanks, and distribution mains. Apart from the urban water-supply project, the other components ofMalawi’s National Water Develop-ment Programme are the townwater supply and sanitation improvement project, the waterresources management project and the water sector managementproject. Malawi will implement the town water-supply andsanitationimprovement project through its three regional waterboards, namely the southern, central and northern region waterboards. The project will expand the water supply facilities and improveoperational efficiency of the three water boards in the largest andfast-growing towns covered by the water boards. The component will also finance the development ofcommunity-managed water supply facilities in market centres, andground-water sources in towns with supply gaps and difficulthydrogeological conditions.

China drought hits water supplies to 1.6 million
Reuters AlertNet – May 25, 2007
In Sichuan, which last year suffered its most severe drought in half a century, 72 counties have not had rain for at least 20 days, Zuo Xiong, deputy director of the Sichuan provincial meteorological station said. Both Gansu and Sichuan are considering trying to make artificial rain to solve their problems, the report added. China is exploring a series of massive water transfer projects to address supply problems in a country with per-capita water resources well below global averages. A government report has also warned that global warming in the future is likely to make China vulnerable to more drought in its arid north and flooding in the south. 651 Yuan) AlertNet news is provided by.