Côte d’Ivoire: FCFA 4.2 trillion to mobilise for water and sanitation

In just ten years, Côte d’Ivoire has made remarkable progress: between 2011 and 2021, access to drinking water rose from around 45% to 66%, and access to sanitation from 22% to 35%. Real progress, yet the road to universal access remains long, and several challenges persist, particularly in securing services and reducing territorial disparities.

To meet this challenge, the Ministry of Hydraulics, Sanitation and Public Cleanliness (MINHAS) developed the National Integrated Strategy for drinking water, sanitation and drainage (SNIAEPA) in 2024. Building on this strategy, the National Development Plan 2026-2050, announced in early 2026, puts the financing needs of the water and sanitation component for the first five-year period (2026-2030) at USD 6.9 billion, or roughly FCFA 4,200 billion.

This is the core purpose of the sector roundtable that MINHAS is preparing on financing investment to achieve SDG 6. The roundtable is funded by the World Bank through the Water Security and Sanitation Support Project (PASEA).

The Phœnix-Artelia Joint Venture has been selected to support the authorities at every stage: from designing the event to setting up a monitoring framework for financial commitments, including advocacy with technical and financial partners (TFPs). The aim is to foster a shared understanding of the sector’s challenges and a common vision, strengthen coordination among stakeholders, present priority projects from the investment programme, and secure concrete commitments from TFPs and the private sector, backed by a clear roadmap for monitoring commitments and implementing investments.

In late September, our team, supported by the firm Forward Global for logistics and events, travelled to Abidjan to kick off the work. The inception mission included meetings with a wide range of public and private sector stakeholders (line ministries, supervised agencies, water operators, etc.), the definition of the working framework, and the launch of document collection.

In close collaboration with MINHAS, our teams are now consolidating the institutional framework for the roundtable and prioritising projects, ahead of drafting the concept note and technical note.

The roundtable is scheduled for the first or second quarter of 2027.