IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/umk/journl/v9y2017i3p21-49.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Restructuring to Improve Water Services in Malaysia

Author

Listed:
  • Nariman Mohd Saad

    (Universiti Utara Malaysia)

  • Azhar Harun

    (Universiti Utara Malaysia)

Abstract

The regulatory structure of the Malaysian water services industry is complex as both the state and federal authority manage water supply at the state level. In 2008, the Federal Government restructured the water industry and centralised the water management of the state government by establishing SPAN (National Water Services Commission) and PAAB (Water Asset Management Company). The objective of SPAN and PAAB is to improve the efficiency of water operators in Peninsular Malaysia including Labuan. Therefore, this study aimed to measure the level of efficiency of the state’s water operators before and after the restructuring, and also to determine the factors that affect the level of efficiency of the state’s water operator. DEA approach (Data Envelopment Analysis), and Malmquist index were used to measure technical efficiency and productivity of the operator over the period 2000-2013. The DEA score showed that the sector’s mean technical efficiency was 73%, and only 42% of the state water operator showed an increasing in efficiency score. Penang’s water operator was the most efficient with a score of one over the study period. Total Factor Productivity analyses show that the water industry lags in the area of technology and inadequate capital. SPAN and PAAB also need to review their current key performance indicators in order for the latter to improve the efficiency of the operators.

Suggested Citation

  • Nariman Mohd Saad & Azhar Harun, 2017. "Restructuring to Improve Water Services in Malaysia," Institutions and Economies (formerly known as International Journal of Institutions and Economies), Faculty of Economics and Administration, University of Malaya, vol. 9(3), pages 21-49, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:umk:journl:v:9:y:2017:i:3:p:21-49
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ijie.um.edu.my/index.php/ijie/article/view/4888/2747
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Goh, Kim Huat & See, Kok Fong, 2021. "Measuring the productivity growth of Malaysia's water sector: Implications for regulatory reform," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 71(C).
    2. Mocholi-Arce, Manuel & Sala-Garrido, Ramon & Molinos-Senante, Maria & Maziotis, Alexandros, 2021. "Water company productivity change: A disaggregated approach accounting for changes in inputs and outputs," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    3. Goh, Kim Huat & See, Kok Fong, 2023. "Incorporating nonrevenue water in the efficiency assessment of water supply utilities: A parametric enhanced hyperbolic distance function," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • L51 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy - - - Economics of Regulation

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:umk:journl:v:9:y:2017:i:3:p:21-49. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Teoh Wern Jun (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/feaummy.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.