Household response to improvements in water infrastructure: Evidence from peri-urban Kyrgyz Republic

By Elcin Akcura, Leon Bost and J. Michelle Brock

Fresh water is an increasingly scarce resource across the world. To prevent excessive water usage, broad participation in appropriately priced municipal water infrastructure and services is necessary. This paper estimates the impact of improvements to water network infrastructure on the take-up of municipal water services in the Kyrgyz Republic. We also assess the intention-to-treat impacts of these infrastructure improvements on households’ willingness to pay for improved water services, and on their time use. We find that infrastructure improvements induce take-up of municipal water taps, but do not generate time savings. The adoption of taps is nevertheless associated with an increase in bathing time, which may mean higher water consumption. New customers also update their willingness to pay after gaining experience with municipal tap connections: they become more willing to pay for better water pressure but less willing to pay for fewer and shorter service outages.