TO gain trust of people, practice what you preach.

This is what Manila Water Co. Inc. president Antonino T. Aquino has been doing in the past 10 years, since taking the helm of leadership of the Ayala-owned water firm servicing the east zone of urban Metro Manila. Looking at what Manila Water has achieved in the last decade, walking the talk has not become trite—it is in fact in the very fiber of its business.

Expressing his firm belief in the very trade of his company, Aquino said in an interview with BusinessMirror that he unswervingly drinks his water from the kitchen sink.

“I drink it straight from the tap. It’s actually a lot better than bottled water,” the Manila Water top executive boasted, attesting to the safety of the water of the concessionaire amid concerns on natural threats and other dangers posed to water sources. “Our bodily systems can take care of biological problems. So our raw water is already good.”

“It gets treated further and, at this point of treatment, it’s already being tested not just by Manila Water, but by 28 other agencies from all over Metro Manila every month.”

The safe quality of water of the East concession is not the only thing Aquino would like the consuming public to trust Manila Water for, but also the value system it has incorporated in its business goals. These business objectives have led to the company building a strong corporate foundation since its difficult inception a decade ago.

“When we started in 1997, we probably had the biggest set of challenges. We were facing at that point in time such challenges as the Asian financial crisis and a series of political predicaments,” Aquino said.

“By embracing all the challenges and putting in place a ‘good corporate culture’ in the organization, we did not only surmount these challenges but even succeeded over and beyond those challenges. This is something that we’re quite happy about.”               

THE bedrock of corporate culture that Manila Water has integrated to its organization is the quality of service it gives to customers. 

“Customer service is something that a utility or a company like us continues to enhance,” Aquino explained. “This is evident by the fact that from a level of having only three million people that we’re serving in 1997, we’re now able to serve about five million.”

In the case of continuous provision of water supply, the east concession has managed to make water accessible to the public at least all day long.

“If in 1997 we probably had only one-fourth of our concession area with 24-hour supply [of water], today we’re practically 98 percent,” the Manila Water president noted, adding that the water firm has also taken the risk of increasing the level of water pressure.

“So even if you do have a breakage on the pipe, the worst thing that may happen is we lose the water, but the bad elements like germs and bacteria would not go in. And that’s precisely what we have done.”  

GIVEN the pivotal role they play in the day-to-day operations of the company, the employees—former public sector workers—play a crucial part on the character-building elements of the organization that is as big as Manila Water.

Eighty percent of Manila Water’s labor force, including eight business area managers, used to be former employees of the government’s Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS).

By investing in their employees’ full potential to help augment the water concession’s businesses, Manila Water has helped them improve their dealings with communities, the very people they serve.

“Our organization is so highly decentralized. We have eight business areas which can deliver 95 percent of the needs of customers,” Aquino said. “Spread out across these areas are our more than 300 territory managers so that they [customers], in turn, would go directly to them [territory managers].”

By empowering employees through an efficient and competent private-sector environment, the Manila Water executive said they remarkably have not been remiss in their responsibilities, and their duty to implement solutions to all the needs of the communities in the east zone. 

AWARE of the fact that provision of water supply in poor or low-income communities is a priority it shares with the local government units and even the national government, Manila Water has aligned and managed to uphold excellent relationships with these communities in this endeavor.

As a consequence, the Manila Water president told BusinessMirror that they “managed to implement projects a lot faster.”

Most of Manila Water’s system losses—or nonrevenue water—emanate from low-income communities. By giving attention to these oftentimes overpopulated and neglected areas with bad infrastructure network, Manila Water has significantly cut its system losses over time.

“From almost two-thirds [of the total amount of water we produced] we had at the start of our business in 1997, we managed to reduce nonrevenue water to only one-fourth today. In addition, we’ve recovered the water that used to be lost and is now made available for everybody’s consumption,” Aquino said.

“This, I think, is a ‘win-win’ proposition that we have managed to do.” 

STEMMING naturally from its water business is the environmental element that Manila Water has integrated as part of its business goals.

This component pertains to one of the business aspects of the water firm—wastewater treatment program aimed at bringing good sanitation and putting a sewerage system in place. This is a major challenge the company has to stand up to, according to Aquino.

“Sanitation and sewerage are the elements that we need to take care of at present. When we started in 1997, only 5 percent of the city had a sewerage system,” the Manila Water top executive said, referring to Makati City.

To be able to double its coverage from 5 percent to 10 percent as well as its wastewater capacity, Manila Water has invested P1 billion  to set up wastewater treatment plants without having to lay out huge collector pipe systems all over the city, said Aquino.

He added that for other parts of the concession area that could not be, at present, connected to the sewerage system, Manila Water has put a system in place whereby a fleet of 50 tanker trucks visit households and communities, collect septage from these places, and bring the septage to processing facilities. These facilities then treat the septage, ensuring that the waters that would be discharged from the plant to the public water systems are clean. Solid wastes are then turned into fertilizer.

True to this calling, the Manila Water has recently partnered with the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority to come up with a plan that would eventually help clean up the Marikina River. 

WHILE service delivery to its more than five million customers has remarkably improved over a decade, it is clear that significant works still need to be done to further improve services in the East Zone.

As such, at least P30 billion is being invested by the Manila Water in the next five years, or P6 billion annually, to expand its network in the service area while exploring other opportunities outside the east concession.

“The P30 billion in capital expenditure will support the continuous expansion of our water and wastewater networks, as well as programs to guarantee the reliability of water we supply to our five million customers,” Aquino said. “A large part of that would go to the improvement of water distribution and reduction of system losses.”

The capital expenditure will focus on four key areas that Manila Water wants to address—the expansion of Manila Water’s distribution system by laying new pipes in underserved areas, the replacement of old pipes to reduce nonrevenue water and ensure service reliability, the improvement of wastewater services, and the development of new water sources.

Since Angat Dam is the only water supply source of Metro Manila, Manila Water will partner with the MWSS in developing new water sources, including the construction of the next major water source, the Laiban Dam Water Project in Tanay, Rizal.

“Developing new sources of water like the Laiban Dam ensures water security in the future,” Aquino said.

The expansion program is projected to add a minimum of one million customers to the company’s existing customer base.  

APART from seeing to it that even small communities have proper water supply, Manila Water also has created an impact in the lives of the people within its concession area through its sustainable development programs.

“Something that is very interesting for us, that we have just started is the creation of a supply chain out of the local communities we are supporting in terms of water supply,” Aquino said.

He cited as an example the manufacturing of components of a water meter assembly such as pipes, fittings, valves, among others. Aside from importing these from China, for instance, Manila Water has developed through a community project a viable alternative.

“We have now developed five barangay cooperatives which actually manufacture these things. They are guaranteed that there is no market risk, we will buy everything,” he said.

“We help them in terms of providing the equipment, initial capital, and we promise to buy everything that they produce, so long as it is the right quality, and it’s the right kind, and they comply with the schedule.

“That’s also not easy sometimes, you make sure that you provide that level of training, organization, but that’s one example.”

To help realize the project, Manila Water has its own sustainable development department to assist the community in these projects.

Aquino stressed the company has not only improved the quality of life of people, but has also created a “subindustry that would support the water sector, and at the same time provide employment, instead of us importing these products from abroad. This, I think, gives us the prestige as a responsible corporate citizen.”

With the alignment of its sustainable development or corporate social and environmental responsibilities in its business goals, Manila Water truly embodies the value system and character building it has put in place since its establishment in 1997.

And in continuing this feat, Aquino would only say: “The limitation to what you can potentially do is only your imagination.”

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