Germany has teamed up with other major European Development Partners - the French AFD, the Danish DANIDA, the European Investment Bank and the EU.
This joint European – Bangladeshi programme is called in short “Saidabad III”.
The project will be implemented by the Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Company (DWASA).
It will ensure that in future, the water for 8 million people in Dhaka will be safe and reliable.
Once this project is implemented, the present sources of water (groundwater and the highly polluted Sitalakhya River) will be replaced by water taken from the mighty Meghna River near Haria, Narayanganj, about 26 km in the East of Dhaka.
From Haria, the raw water will be pumped to the Saidabad Water Treatment Plant, where an additional, third water treatment plant will be constructed, increasing the water production by 450,000 m³ per day to daily production of 900,000 m³.
“This will enable the Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Company to serve more people in Bangladesh's capital city,” said German Ambassador in Dhaka Peter Fahrenholtz.
“And it will make it services less dependent from the use of groundwater and therefore more resistant to climate change, especially during dry seasons and in view of the increasing salinization of its aquifers,” he added.
The overall project costs are expected to be about EUR 570 out of which the Government of Bangladesh will provide EUR 140 million.
The signing ceremony was attended, among others, by Kazi Shofiqul Azam, Senior Secretary and Khalilur Rahman, Chief (Europe Wing), both ERD, Ministry of Finance, Marie-Annick Bourdin, and Peter Fahrenholtz, Ambassadors of France and Germany, respectively, CarenBlume, Deputy Head of Development Cooperation, German Embassy and Regina Maria Schneider, Director of the KfW Regional Office for Bangladesh and Nepal and Quamrun Nahar Laily, Superintending Engineer and Project Director for Saidabad III, DWASA.