Welcome to Samoa’s Water for Life website. The Water for Life initiative is an ongoing process to stimulate the development of Samoa’s Water and Sanitation sector through a sector-wide approach.

The Water for Life Sector Plan 2008 - 2010 continues to guide the water and sanitation sector developments though a framework for action based on the following sectoral objectives:

• To strengthen sector governance and orientation;
• To ensure sustainable water resources management;
• To increase access to safe and relaiable water supplies;
• To improve sanitation, drainage, and wastewater treatment and siaposal.

The sectoral objectives support Samoa's national development agenda as articulated in the SDS 2008 - 2012 and aim to ensure the realization of improved public health and alleviation of poverty through community access to water of suitable quality and appropriate quantities to meet all reasonable health, environmental and economic development needs.  The successful implementation of these objectives will further assist Samoa in achieving its MDGs in particular Goal 7 which aims to "halve by 2015 the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation".

The domain of the sector includes the regulation, development and use of all fresh water resources as well as the receiving coastal waters in Samoa.  Over the years, sanitation has evolved as a priority issue in the sector.  The endorsement of the National Sanitation Policy by CDC in February 2010 is therefore timely in establishing the required policy framework to improve wastewater systems and management in Samoa.

The sector forms one of the 14 sectors under the Government's sector planning initiative.  Of fundamental imporance to the sustainability of the sector is the consolidation of a solid sector policy framework to guide the sector programme, a medium to long term expenditure framework to deliver its programme, a comprehensive and targeted capacity building plan for requisite capacity needs, a performance management framework in place and last but not least an effective coordination mechanism in place.

The Water Sector Support Programme (WaSSP) was successful in creating a comprehensive and coherent framework for the development and evolution of the sector to sector budget support through:

• Consolidation of a sector policy framework;
• Development of a Medium term expenditure framework;
• Performance Management Framework and system in place;
• Sector coordination framework.

Regional projects include the SOPAC implemented Sustainable Integrated Water Resources and Wastewater Management (IWRM) in Pacific Island Countries, funded by the Global Environmental Facility (GEF), and the Pacific Hydrological Cycle Observing System (HYCOS), funded by the EU-Water Facility (EU-WF).