A/66/255 all of the Government’s cash and provides a trail of how the funds are spent and to whom, 94 offers one way of addressing this challenge. 65. Similarly, with multiple agencies and stakeholders focusing on the same sector, there is a high potential for overlap or wasteful duplication of services. For instance, a report on water point mapping in Malawi found that, as a result of lack of coordination, new water points were drilled next to existing boreholes while under-served areas continued to be neglected. 95 Accordingly, even if it were possible to determine how much a State is spending on water and sanitation at any given moment, it still might be difficult to determine the amount of resources that could be available if this waste were eliminated. Finally, different institutions, including international donors, may have different monitoring mechanisms for water and sanitation that consider various criteria and employ unique methodologies. This poses a serious problem for Governments hoping to implement a national water and sanitation strategy, as it leads to varying assessments of need and cost. 96 66. The Special Rapporteur has emphasized the importance of national planning and a clear allocation of responsibilities to effectively realize the rights to water and sanitation (see A/HRC/18/33). States must therefore take their obligation to coordinate the work of actors at all levels seriously, and adopt comprehensive sector-wide policies for water and sanitation. 97 B. Problems of transparency 67. Limited transparency within the water and sanitation sectors represents another key challenge to accurately taking stock of resources. Transparent budgeting for water and sanitation is essential to the sustainability and long-term success of improvements in the sector as it supports predictability, planning and the equitable distribution of resources and facilitates coordination among various agencies. Transparent budgeting can also serve as a platform for advocacy and accountability within vulnerable or unserved communities. 98 68. A low level of transparency in budgeting is primarily the product of a lack of detail in budgeting. All too often, national budgets do not adequately account for how, where and by whom expenditures in the water and sanitation sector will be allocated. This problem is closely related to horizontal fragmentation, mentioned above, whereby water and sanitation are enveloped within multiple broader portfolios. Even where budgets are sufficiently detailed, access to information about the budget may still be limited. Specific water and sanitation initiatives, such as __________________ 94 95 96 97 98 22 Ehtisham Ahmad, “Macro, fiscal and decentralization options to address marginality: reaching the extreme poor”, paper prepared for the International Roundtable Conference on Marginality and Extreme Poverty: Towards Inclusive Development for and with the Poorest, held at the Centre for Development Research, University of Bonn, Germany, from 20 to 22 June 2011. Katharina Welle, “Learning for advocacy and good practice: WaterAid water point mapping: report of findings based on country visits to Malawi and Tanzania”, WaterAid Report (London, Overseas Development Institute, December 2005). Available from www.odi.org.uk/resources/ download/2952.pdf. WHO and UNICEF, Joint Monitoring Programme for Water Supply and Sanitation (www.wssinfo.org/country-collaborations/data-reconciliation). General Comment No. 15 (2002) of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, para. 51. UNDP, Human Development Report 2006, p. 63. 11-44364