World Bank and Águas de Portugal agree to strengthen their international partnership


The World Bank and Águas de Portugal have agreed to strengthen and deepen their international partnership for the management of water and sanitation services, spanning the undertaking of studies, projects, technical assistance programs as well as other activities, including knowledge sharing, research and development.

The memorandum of understanding hereby signed consolidates the objective of the World Bank, set out through Water Global Practice ("WGP”), and the Águas de Portugal Group to jointly contribute towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of Agenda 2030 and especially SDG 6 – Water.

The global leader of Water and Sanitation at the World Bank, responsible for WGP, Gustavo Saltiel, highlighted the significance of this partnership to the extent that “Águas de Portugal, in addition to representing one of the world’s benchmark companies for water and sanitation services, represents an institutional state model that has provided answers to the problems of the sector in Portugal for the last three decades. The good news is that Águas de Portugal is prepared to stand up to the newly emerging challenges of the climate transition, changes in the profile of demand and water scarcity, which makes this an interesting case for other countries going through similar situations”.

In turn, according to the President of the Águas de Portugal Group, José Furtado, “the partnership with the World Bank enables the combining of many distinctive characteristics of both entities for water management with applications for various regions of the world. Climate changes, with water at the top of concerns, worsen situations that were already extremely critical and raise the levels of demand even higher on the response capacities of those operating in this sector. Thus, we are extremely grateful to be able to contribute with our experience and convey to the exterior the water sector cluster of competences in Portugal”.

This highlights how the Águas de Portugal Group serves as one of the key partners in the World Bank initiative “Utilities for the Future”, contributing towards greater efficiency, resilience and technological progress at a broad range of water service management institutions all around the world and enabling them to establish long term plans and strive to achieve the SDGs and Agenda 2030.

Within the scope of this initiative, the World Bank participates as the largest global financing entity for institutional reforms of the water sector and sustainable solutions, including the operation and construction of supply and sanitation systems, with quality and resilience, seeking to overcome the difficulties of some countries with poor financial and institutional capacities for undertaking investments and modernising their management structures that would enable them to cope with the various contemporary and future challenges, including adaptation to climate change and the need for more appropriate, resilient and inclusive environmental systems.

In turn, the Águas de Portugal Group provides support to water and sanitation companies within the scope of designing and implementing wide reaching and effective plans, deploying digital transformation and technological modernisation alongside new business processes, innovative organisational structures and cultural changes in preparation for the newly emerging and increasingly demanding climatic, social and demographic changes. 


10 of November of 2022