Experts Say the World's Water Crisis Is Solvable — if Funders Stop Just Drilling Wells

A quarter of the world still lacks clean drinking water in 2026, and a panel at the Concordia Annual Summit argued the reason is surprisingly simple: the global development sector has been measuring the wrong thing. Three leaders in water, energy, and philanthropy made the case that shifting from counting installations to guaranteeing reliable service could redirect billions in development finance toward the communities that need it most.

• Panelists call for redefining global water goals from "access" to service uptime, ahead of UN Water Conference
• Energy entrepreneur says solar-powered model that connected 20 million people to power can be replicated for water
• Hilton Foundation CEO admits 15 years of drilling wells in Ghana failed — every one eventually broke down
• $11.5 million annual gap identified to serve 4 million Ghanaians in remote communities
• Panelists report high willingness to pay among subsistence farmers when service is consistent

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The Access Trap: Why Drilling a Well Isn't Enough

Why it matters: The Millennium Development Goals and subsequent Sustainable Development Goals set "access" — whether a water point was installed — as the benchmark for progress. Panelists argued this metric has created perverse incentives across the global water sector, rewarding governments and lenders for building infrastructure that no one is responsible for maintaining.

Where things stand: Kate Sinkada, co-founder and executive director of Saha Global, laid out the core problem in stark terms. "Access is really defined by, was a water point that delivers safe water installed here? Yes or no? So after installation, you can check the box. Yes, we drilled the borehole. Yes, we installed the water system. And then you really never have to follow up again," she said, contrasting that with a reliable water service — "Is water flowing every day to people when they need it?" — benchmarked at 96% uptime.

The numbers in Ghana illustrate the consequences. Sinkada identified roughly 4 million people living in communities of fewer than 1,000 who are beyond the reach of public utilities. "Their water fees alone just can't cover the full cost. And you leave about an $11.5 million gap per year to be able to really get consistent, high-quality water services to these people," she said. Private providers, operating in an unregulated market, cherry-pick dense, profitable areas and skip the rest.

Peter Loharn, president and CEO of the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, offered a candid confession that underscored the point. "The Hilton Foundation has been funding water in Ghana for about 30 years. And for the first 15 years, we punched a lot of wells and all of them eventually broke down," he said. That experience drove the foundation to embrace a business-model approach focused on operations and maintenance rather than construction alone.

Decisions: No formal votes were taken at this panel discussion, but panelists converged on a clear policy recommendation. Sinkada called on the upcoming UN Water Conference in Abu Dhabi to make the shift explicit: "One thing I would love to see is this shift of focus away from access and infrastructure and towards talking about water as a reliable service, as a long-term reliable service. Just that one change in framing, I think, would be a huge win for the sector in general."

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The Energy Playbook: 20 Million Connections and a $1 Price Point

The basics: Distributed solar energy in sub-Saharan Africa underwent a dramatic transformation when three forces converged: the ability to generate power at the point of use, a price point below alternatives like kerosene, and digital infrastructure — mobile payments and remote metering — that made per-unit billing possible at massive scale.

Why it matters: Yariv Cohen, founder and CEO of Ignite Energy Access, argued those same forces are now emerging in water and could unlock a similar revolution.

"The energy sector became investable when we started having the ability to produce the power where the client is. Solar power is everywhere. Small parlors can make it work," Cohen said. His company has connected 20 million people to power across 13 countries, charging as little as $1 per month. "Children can study longer, which is the main value. Women's safety is a substantial issue, healthcare, health, and we also saw an increase in economic activity," he said.

Cohen acknowledged water is harder — it requires moving the product repeatedly rather than generating it once — but said the digital billing infrastructure and cost-reduction trajectory transfer directly. Solar-powered pumps can now serve anyone within 500 meters of a water source, and the externalities of contaminated water are finally being measured and priced.

The other side: The gap between energy and water is not trivial. Water requires ongoing pumping, treatment, and distribution — recurring physical logistics that electricity avoids. Cohen characterized this as a timing issue rather than a structural barrier, but the panel did not detail how quickly the transition could happen.

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Concessions, Subsidies, and the Path to Break-Even

Why it matters: If the problem is that private providers skip unprofitable communities, the solution panelists proposed is regulatory: force providers to serve everyone.

Where things stand: Sinkada advocated for concession-based models where providers who win utility contracts must serve entire regions — profitable towns and remote villages alike. "If you win that contract, you have to serve everybody from the more dense towns to the most remote last-mile village," she said. The key to making that work, she argued, is transparency. "You can't expect the government to show up and be able to help support with subsidies for the poorest customers if they don't understand the cost of service. So we've been trying to be really public about analyzing our cost data, sharing that with government."

Cohen described a tiered subsidy structure already working in the energy sector. Governments pay a fraction of what grid connections would cost, with higher per-connection payments for harder-to-reach households. "We get very little if it's in the city, nothing. Very urban, you can get a buck or two. You go deeper, you get 5. You go to a household where it's only a woman leading the house, you get a little bit more," he said. Rich data collection on clients — floor type, roof quality — allows funders to price impact precisely.

Loharn expressed confidence that these models are gaining institutional traction, pointing to the World Bank's new campaign to reach 1 billion people with water. He stressed that philanthropic subsidies for the farthest communities should eventually be absorbed into development bank lending. "We need to build it into the lending that comes from the development banks and from private capital so that operations and maintenance and the ability to replace the infrastructure is built in," he said, warning against the current pattern of "taking a loan for infrastructure that breaks down and having payments without benefit."

What's next: Loharn projected that rural water systems could approach break-even within five to 10 years. "I think we can bring rural water systems to a nearly break-even on the whole sort of enterprise, and I think we can build in operations and maintenance to what governments and development banks do, and between the two of those, we will provide a great service," he said.

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The Poorest Customers Pay Best

One of the panel's most counterintuitive findings: subsistence farmers are highly reliable payers — often more so than wealthier populations — when services are consistent and priced within reach.

Sinkada reported from Saha Global's work in Ghana that "people are willing to pay and they're more willing to pay the longer they have a reliable service. So many of our customers are used to someone coming, drilling a well, it breaks down, and then they don't at that one time have enough money saved for this big repair." She added that convenience and proximity often matter more than water quality arguments in driving payment — people pay more readily for water that is closer and easier to fetch.

Cohen corroborated from the energy side: "There's high willingness to pay, and when they have ability to pay, they pay. So, if you're able to price it where it fits, they pay, and they pay better than us. They don't have bad debt."

The finding undermines a longstanding assumption in development finance — that water services for the poorest communities must be entirely charity-funded — and strengthens the case for commercially viable models that blend modest user fees with targeted subsidies.

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Minor Items

• Moderator Louisa Savage, editorial director of Washington Post Intelligence, framed the panel by noting that a quarter of the world's population still lacks clean drinking water in 2026, calling it "a little bit mind-boggling" in an era focused on AI risks.
• The panel took place at the Concordia Annual Summit on Sept. 23, 2026.