Policy and regulatory context for self-supplied drinking water services in two cities in Indonesia: Priorities for managing risks

Self-supply is the dominant drinking water service model for urban Indonesia. This paper examines its governance arrangements to identify risks due to the inexistence or implementation gaps of laws and regulations. The research applied a socio-ecological perspective to analyse interactions between water resources, governance, infrastructure and users and related-water security outcomes. We adopted a case study approach focused on two self-supply dominant urban areas by reviewing relevant regulations and conducting interviews with stakeholders. The findings show that water security outcomes for self-supplied services were at risk. Overarching laws exist to support groundwater preservation. However, in practice over-extraction and contamination are common, resulting in environmental risks. Governance of groundwater use and associated permits demonstrate fragmented responsibilities and lack of a coordinated institutional framework to guarantee water safety and availability. Whilst construction standards define minimum distance of wells to pollution sources, non-compliance is common, pointing to technical risks. Users are formally responsible for storage, treatment and monitoring water quality but practice varies across households. The result is a range of potential social and health risks. The study demonstrates a need for strengthened and coordinated implementation of the existing laws and regulations as well as increased acknowledgement of self-supply in policies in a concerted effort to ensure accessibility, safety and reliability of those services. We propose a modified governance framework to support further analytical and practical efforts to address risks to self-supplied services, towards improving safe and equitable water service delivery in Indonesia and elsewhere.