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Water supply and sanitation in China is undergoing a massive transition while facing numerous challenges such as rapid urbanization, increasing economic inequality, and the supply of water to rural areas. Water scarcity and pollution also impact access to water.
Progress has been made in the past decades, with increased access to services, increased municipal wastewater treatment, the creation of water and wastewater utilities that are legally and financially separated from local governments, and increasing cost recovery as part of the transformation of the Chinese economy to a more market-oriented system. The government quadrupled investments in the sector during the Eleventh Five-Year Plan.
Nevertheless, much remains to be achieved. According to survey data analyzed by the Joint Monitoring Program for Water and Sanitation of WHO and UNICEF, about 100 million Chinese still did not have access to an improved water source in 2008, and about 460 million did not have access to improved sanitation. Progress in rural areas appears to lag behind what has been achieved in urban areas. According to data presented by the Joint Monitoring Program for Water Supply and Sanitation of WHO and UNICEF in 2015, about 36% of the rural population in China still did not have access to improved sanitation.