A Embasa no contexto da universalização do saneamento na Bahia: avanços, riscos, limitações e desafioss

Abstract

Embasa (Empresa Baiana de Águas e Saneamento S.A.) is a state company, which serves 87% of Bahia’s municipalities and which, due to its scope, plays a fundamental role in this context. Although in recent years, the company has made progress in terms of service rates, there are risks and challenges inherent to its activity and the peculiarities of the state, which has about 70% of its territory in a semi-arid region and a profile of large population concentration in a few municipalities. By considering access to water and sanitary sewage as a human right, essential to life and the provision of water and sewage services as a social function of the state, the objective of the research is to analyze Embasa's advances, risks, limitations, and challenges in the implementation of the sanitation policy and the context of the universalization of water and sewage services for the State of Bahia. The methodology consists of a qualitative and quantitative approach, through documentary research, collection, and analysis of secondary data, semi-structured interviews, and content analysis. The main theoretical references used are the role of the state, as well as the application of public policies for the sanitation sector, and the concepts that structure this work are public policies, basic sanitation, cross-subsidy, universalization, and regionalization. The research seeks to identify which elements interfere with Embasa's performance, considering the changes imposed by Law 14.026/2020, which poses risks to the company's performance, in addition to structural issues such as the importance of the cross-subsidy mechanism in the provision of water and sewage services in the state. Risks related to political influence and limitations resulting from the company's installed capacity and investment were also analyzed. The survey results show the company's leading role in terms of investments in water and sewage systems, as well as advances in serving the urban population, in particular. The identified gaps concern sanitary sewage throughout the area of operation and water supply in the rural area of the state