The Sultanate of Oman is one of the countries in the world with the fastest economic growth since 1970. Water resource is key to support Oman’s development and people.
The Public Authority for Electricity and Water is responsible for providing drinking water in Oman, a strategic resource to 2.3 million Omanis.
PAEW will face two major challenges in the next two decades:
- A significant growth of water assets and service coverage – with an objective of supplying piped water to more than 90% of the Omani population
- The need for service and performance improvement to meet the growing customers’ expectations.
In order to get prepared, PAEW decided to launch a co-management contract awarded in 2011 to Veolia.
In the scope of this contract, 10 Veolia key managers are seconded into PAEW to define a strategy and manage its implementation in each of the key areas of the business: Operations and Water Quality, Customer Service, Projects Execution, Asset Management, IT, Health and Safety, Quality management, and Human Resources Development.
A team from Seureca, the Consultancy subsidiary of Veolia, provides continuous expertise, technical and strategic assistance to the Veolia key staff and PAEW.
Veolia first worked in cooperation with PAEW, to elaborate five year strategies covering the critical areas of a water business. Those strategies were then aggregated into a comprehensive business plan responding to a strategic Master Plan for the water sector up to 2035. These strategies were then translated into manuals and procedures aiming to guide the work at each step and enable everybody in PAEW to work towards the same strategic goals:
- Develop Human Resources
- Improve operational efficiency
- Become a customer oriented organization
- Turn PAEW into a world class utility
In parallel, the contract also includes 9 specific projects to be delivered by Veolia in the first two and a half years of the contract. These projects, aimed at providing PAEW with the right tools and methods to efficiently perform :
- HR development, training & knowledge transfer
- Policy & Strategy (related to 12 PAEW activities)
- Strategic Business Plan
- Development of Operational Manuals & Procedures (related to 13 PAEW activities)
- Asset Register and Management
- Performance Monitoring System
- Customer Services Management
- Capital Management
- Non-Revenue Water Assessement country wide, with the creation of District Metered Areas (DMAs) and their permanent monitoring, while implementing NRW reduction measures.
The Veolia team is working for and inside PAEW to form one team with one goal. The success of one party is critical to the success of the other party. The cooperation is maximized with one objective: make of PAEW a reference for water utilities to the benefits of customers.
Client benefits :
- Operational efficiency
- Knowledge transfer
- Water losses reduction
Solution :
- Co-management partnership
305 000 customers
12 000 km of network