Current water quality practices in Pacific Island Countries (PICs) are strongly focused on meeting
standards for treated drinking water and on compliance monitoring by testing the end product;
however, over the years a number of limitations became apparent, such as the fact that only a
fraction of the total water supplied is tested, and that the test results are not generated in real time
so cannot consistently ensure safe quality of drinking water. To address these issues, the 3rd
edition of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Drinking-water Quality Guidelines (2008)
proposes a more effective risk assessment and risk management approach for drinking water
through the application of a Drinking Water Safety Plan (DWSP). The DWSP introduces a
proactive approach to the management of the water supply, as opposed to the traditional reactive
approach. It places emphasis on the identification and monitoring of risks and hazards to ensure
that measures are taken to consistently minimize or eliminate the potential for the realization of
these risks.
Although water currently supplied on Niue is considered safe and is piped to 100 per cent of the
population, the groundwater source remains highly vulnerable to surface activities and other
threats. The Niue Water Supply Division has developed the DWSP of their water supply as a
means to continuously ensure the provision of safe drinking water into the future. To clarify the
value of investing in the DWSP, this document describes an economic feasibility assessment of
the recently developed Niue DWSP. The findings will be used to illustrate the potential returns
from investing in the approach and thus advocate for more efficient investment in the approach.
Although consultations established that there were no reported outbreaks of water-borne illness
from drinking water on Niue, it is generally agreed and recognized that there would be benefits
from maintaining the present quality of the water supply. Using limited existing data and a
hypothetical scenario presented in this report, the main benefit of investing in the approach would
appear to be the prevention or mitigation of potential future health cost resulting from water-borne
outbreaks, with benefits also achieved from reductions in bottled water consumption as an
alternative water source, and reductions in leakages from the water system.
The total cost of establishing and implementing water safety planning in Niue using the scenario
presented is estimated to be NZ $0.7 million, while the overall present value benefit could be
around NZ $0.86 million; a return of NZ $1.20 for every dollar invested. Nevertheless, as the
Government of Niue anticipates implementation costs largely being funded externally, the
Government expects to directly bear only the operational cost of the DWSP which is estimated to
be NZ $0.2 million. At the same time, the Government covers all medical and water supply costs
on Niue, so would directly benefit from improved water safety through avoided health and system
leakage costs to the tune of around NZ $0.6 million. This would generate an estimated return to
the Niue Government of around NZ $2.90 for every dollar invested in the DWSP.
In both the case where the Government of Niue might be expected to cover all DWSP
implementation costs, and where it might only cover operational costs, the benefits that the Water
Safety Plan could have to reduce social disruption related to health problems were not valued. In
Niue’s particular case with such a low population, this may be significant. The payoffs from the
scenarios presented are therefore likely to be underestimated.