IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/oxdevs/v38y2010i2p199-217.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Heterogeneity in the Cost Structure of Water and Sanitation Services: A Cross-country Comparison of Conditions for Scale Economies

Author

Listed:
  • Celine Nauges
  • Caroline van den Berg

Abstract

The main purpose of this article is to compare the cost structure of water utilities across a set of 14 countries with different levels of economic development. As far as is known, the cross-country perspective is novel in this literature. This article first provides new measures of returns to scale in the water and sanitation sector for a set of countries, most of them from the developing world. It is then shown that the probability of a utility operating under decreasing, constant, or increasing returns to scale depends not only on its characteristics (the volume of water produced in particular), but also on the country's level of economic development (gross national income) and business environment as measured by investor protection, the cost of enforcing contracts and perceptions of corruption.

Suggested Citation

  • Celine Nauges & Caroline van den Berg, 2010. "Heterogeneity in the Cost Structure of Water and Sanitation Services: A Cross-country Comparison of Conditions for Scale Economies," Oxford Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(2), pages 199-217.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:oxdevs:v:38:y:2010:i:2:p:199-217
    DOI: 10.1080/13600811003753768
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13600811003753768
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/13600811003753768?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Estache, Antonio & Perelman, Sergio & Trujillo, Lourdes, 2005. "Infrastructure performance and reform in developing and transition economies: evidence from a survey of productivity measures," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3514, The World Bank.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Zschille, Michael, 2012. "Consolidating the Water Industry: An Analysis of the Potential Gains from Horizontal Integration in a Conditional Efficiency Fr," CEPR Discussion Papers 8737, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Ferro, Gustavo & Lentini, Emilio & Mercadier, Augusto & Romero, Carlos A., 2010. "Retornos a escala en agua y saneamiento: estimaciones para América Latina [Returns to scale in water and sanitation: estimates for Latin Amercia]," MPRA Paper 20324, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Jan 2010.
    3. van den Berg, Caroline, 2014. "The drivers of non-revenue water : how effective are non-revenue water reduction programs ?," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6997, The World Bank.
    4. Michael Zschille, 2012. "Consolidating the Water Industry: An Analysis of the Potential Gains from Horizontal Integration in a Conditional Efficiency Framework," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1187, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    5. Michael Zschille, 2015. "Consolidating the water industry: an analysis of the potential gains from horizontal integration in a conditional efficiency framework," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 44(1), pages 97-114, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Narayanamoorthy, A. & Hanjra, Munir A., 2006. "Rural Infrastructure and Agricultural Output Linkages: A Study of 256 Indian Districts," Indian Journal of Agricultural Economics, Indian Society of Agricultural Economics, vol. 61(3), pages 1-16.
    2. Dethier, Jean-Jacques, 2013. "Coping with urban fiscal stress around the world," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6693, The World Bank.
    3. Emanuele Lobina & David Hall, 2008. "The comparative advantage of the public sector in the development of urban water supply," Progress in Development Studies, , vol. 8(1), pages 85-101, January.
    4. Mikail Pehlivan & Nazan Susam, 2022. "Transformation of Water Services: Lessons Learned from Water Privatization in Multiple Countries," Journal of Economy Culture and Society, Istanbul University, Faculty of Economics, vol. 65(65), pages 129-160, June.
    5. Nordås, Hildegunn Kyvik, 2007. "International production sharing: A case for a coherent policy framework," WTO Discussion Papers 11, World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic Research and Statistics Division.
    6. Lin, Chen, 2005. "Service quality and prospects for benchmarking: Evidence from the Peru water sector," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 230-239, September.
    7. Hulya Dagdeviren, 2011. "Political Economy Of Contractual Disputes In Private Water And Sanitation:Lessons From Argentina," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 82(1), pages 25-44, March.
    8. Caldeirinha, V. M., 2011. "Size and specialization as determinant of iberian port performance: new methodology to group different ports," MPRA Paper 31957, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Dethier, Jean-Jacques & Moore, Alexander, 2012. "Infrastructure in developing countries: An overview of some economic issues," Discussion Papers 123305, University of Bonn, Center for Development Research (ZEF).
    10. Emmanuelle Auriol & Sara Biancini, 2015. "Powering Up Developing Countries through Integration?," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 29(1), pages 1-40.
    11. Seroa da Motta, Ronaldo & Moreira, Ajax, 2006. "Efficiency and regulation in the sanitation sector in Brazil," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 185-195, September.
    12. Nauges, Celine & van den Berg, Caroline, 2007. "How"natural"are natural monopolies in the water supply and sewerage sector ? Case studies from developing and transition economies," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4137, The World Bank.
    13. Caldeirinha, Vitor R. & Felicio, J. Augusto, 2011. "A influência dos factores de caracterização dos portos no desempenho, medido por indicadores operacionais, financeiros e de eficiência [The influence of factors characterizing the performance of po," MPRA Paper 30009, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Hulya Dagdeviren & Simon A. Robertson, 2009. "Access to Water in the Slums of the Developing World," Working Papers 57, International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth.
    15. Chen Lin & Sanford Berg, 2008. "Incorporating Service Quality into Yardstick Regulation: An Application to the Peru Water Sector," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 32(1), pages 53-75, February.
    16. de Souza Pereira, Mariana & Magalhães Filho, Fernando Jorge Corrêa & de Morais Lima, Priscila & Tabak, Benjamin Miranda & Constantino, Michel, 2022. "Sanitation and water services: Who is the most efficient provider public or private? Evidences for Brazil," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    17. Estache, Antonio & Tovar, Beatriz & Trujillo, Lourdes, 2008. "How efficient are African electricity companies? Evidence from the Southern African countries," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(6), pages 1969-1979, June.
    18. Vinnari, Eija M. & Hukka, Jarmo J., 2007. "Great expectations, tiny benefits - Decision-making in the privatization of Tallinn water," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 15(2), pages 78-85, June.
    19. Hulya Dagdeviren, 2009. "Limits To Competition And Regulation In Privatized Electricity Markets," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 80(4), pages 641-664, December.
    20. Andreia Teixeira Marques Dionísio, 2013. "The container terminal characteristics and customer’s satisfaction," CEFAGE-UE Working Papers 2013_14, University of Evora, CEFAGE-UE (Portugal).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:oxdevs:v:38:y:2010:i:2:p:199-217. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/CODS20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.