Management of water quality in Chile: key aspects for improvement

ABSTRACT

Water quality management has increasingly been based on the adoption of risk management frameworks as defined by Water Safety Plans (WSP), through the World Health Organization Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality. The potential application of such frameworks in Chile has not been fully explored, therefore it is necessary to identify aspects of water quality management which are currently not consistent with such an approach. A template for successful adaptation is provided by the framework for Management of Drinking Water Quality applied in Australia, through the Australian Drinking Water Guidelines (ADWG). This study employed the management framework presented in the ADWG, to evaluate gaps in risk management as it is applied in the drinking water sector in Chile. Substantial differences were detected in the assessment of the supply system, preventive measures, R&D, the needs for review and continual improvement, as well as concepts and tools including multiple barriers and critical control points.

KEYWORDS:

• Water Safety Plans
• drinking water guidelines
• regulation
• risk management

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the valuable information provided by the experts who were interviewed for this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed https://doi.org/10.1080/1573062X.2021.1878239