On the 5th World Water Forum in Istanbul, (2009) emphasizes the importance of an equitable, optimal and sustainable management of water resources in order to cope with increasing water demands due to population growth, economic development, migration and urbanization and the negative effects of climate change.

When it comes to operating water supply systems, water losses are a clear obstacle to sustainability, as the following list of potential impacts shows:

Economic impacts: costs for exploiting, treating and transporting water which is lost on its way to the customer without generating any revenue for the water utility. Pipe bursts and leaks necessitate expensive repair works and may also cause considerable damage to nearby infrastructure.

Technical impacts: leakage leads to reduced coverage of the existing water demand, possibly so much so that the system can no longer operate continuously. Intermittent supply will cause further technical problems by air intruding into the pipes and will tempt customers to install private storage tanks.

Social impacts: water losses result in customers being adversely affected by supply failures, such as low pressure, service interruptions and unequal supply, but also by health risks which may arise from the infiltration of sewage and other pollutants into pipe systems under low pressure or intermittent supply.

Ecological impacts: compensating water losses by further increasing water extraction places additional stress on water resources and requires additional energy and thus causes carbon dioxide emissions that could have been avoided.