(Business in Cameroon) - The Cameroonian capital is hosting, starting today, a two-day international symposium on the management of companies active in the production and distribution of clean water. The workshop is organized by the African Water Association (AfWA), which Cameroon rejoined in November 2022, after years of absence.

It brings together the heads of water management companies of Central African countries to discuss the “Financial viability of water utilities in Africa: control of commercial losses and fraud on the drinking water network”. It aims to contribute to the improvement of the financial performance of the targeted companies through better control of sales techniques and fraud control. Participants will learn about the innovative solutions developed by equipment suppliers to control losses.

"These two days of brainstorming are crucial for the survival of our companies. Together, we will succeed and come up at the end of this conference with the guidelines of a new model of society for the production and distribution of drinking water in the Central African sub-region," says Blaise Moussa, MD of Cameroon Water Utilities (Camwater) and First Vice President of AfWA for Central Africa.

The Yaoundé conference comes at a time when "massive fraud" on the drinking water distribution network has reached "worrying proportions" in the major cities of Cameroon, according to Blaise Moussa. According to him, this is "the consequence of complacency, serious failures, and complicity of the staff responsible for distribution units, etc.”    

BRM