Review of Organizational Structures, Staffing Levels and Redeployment at New Water Sector Institutions

The Kenya water sector is under radical reform that is driven by its national policy on water resources management and development and its strategies on water resources management and water services. These policies and strategies are backed up by a new Water Act of 2002 and a draft Zero Investment Plan. The most important new institutions in the Water Sector are the following: Water Service Boards, Water Services Trust Fund, Water Resources Management Authority, Water Services Regulatory Board and Water Appeal Board.

The main thrust of the reforms and the ongoing Sector Wide Approach to Planning is to separate water resources management, water services delivery and sector funding and to focus the role of Ministry of Water and Irrigation (MWI) on policy. Detailed regulations are left to a number of parastatal bodies that report to boards representing different stakeholder interests. The co-operation between Kenya, Sweden and Denmark supports:

1. Rural Water Supply and Sanitation (RWSS)
2. Water Resources Management (WRM)
3. Water Sector Reform (WSR)

As part of the ongoing water sector reform process, the Ministry of Water and Irrigation (MWI) is undergoing a major organisational restructuring to reflect its new role in the water sector. Several new institutions and organisations have been established that created their initial organisational structures and staffing levels. The Plan of Transfer of Water Services has been implemented to the effect that all MWI regional and district level staff were deployed to the new Water Services Boards and Water Resources Management Authority regional offices in 2005. The Transfer Plan required that all organisational structures and staff employments, re-deployments or retrenchments should be implemented by June 2006.