Opening remarks by the Prince of Orange, Chair of UNSGAB at the High-Level Round Table: Action for Access: Catapulting the sanitation and water sector to meet the MDGs

Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen,

It is a pleasure to join you today as Chair of the UN Secretary-General's Advisory Board on Water and Sanitation. When Kofi Annan created our Board in 2004 he asked us to help him accelerate progress towards the MDG target for water and sanitation by raising awareness, mobilising funds and encouraging new partnerships. Without a doubt, this event falls squarely within our mandate! It is extremely encouraging - and gratifying - to witness the growing commitment to working together around the globe to ensure that all of us have the basic foundations for a healthy, productive and dignified life.

Since landing in Washington, I have met several Americans who are deeply committed to expanding sanitation and water services to the un-served. Yesterday I spoke to Senator Richard Durbin and this morning to Maria Otero, Under Secretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs. It is most encouraging to see the United States taking water and sanitation more seriously than ever before and speaking out forcefully, as the Secretary of State did in her World Water Day speech just last month. Water issues, Mrs Clinton said, are an urgent concern every day of every year for individuals, communities, and countries around the world. How good it is to know that Mrs Clinton and I are on the same page!

I hope all the countries gathered for these momentous meetings will share this positive spirit. Now, more than ever before, it is vital to make a collective effort to provide the world's population with basic sanitation and clean drinking water. The obstacles are daunting, but the solutions are within our reach.

And most of the pressing challenges in the water and sanitation sector are institutional rather than technological in nature. Allow me to give you one quick first-hand example from our own experience. The interactions between ODA, national and municipal budgets for water and sanitation services are often complex and ambiguous, and that impedes progress. Recently, our Board and the World Bank undertook a joint study on access to local financing for utilities in Peru. It revealed valuable insights as to how ODA can help, rather than hinder, local financial markets to lend for water and sanitation services. It is important to understand how these markets work, because if we want to develop the water and sanitation sector at all administrative levels, we must make sure that affordable financing from local financial institutions is available. It is critical that these funding and executive institutions flourish.

I know our time is extremely short and so I will end here by thanking the World Bank for organising this event to catapult the sanitation and water sectors towards the MDGs. Let's hope we are catapulted as far as possible during our short time together!

Thank you.