A/70/203 I. Introduction 1. Realizing the human rights to water and sanitation depends on a combination of various factors. On a national level, these factors include appropriate policies, programmes and planning that reflect a long-term vision to ensure the realization of these rights. Implementation of these policies, programmes and plans includes developing appropriate institutions, financing, regulation and the capacity of local authorities and other actors, as well as the selection, implementation and management of technical solutions. Measures meant to ensure access to water, sanitation and appropriate hygiene practices occur in a variety of contexts that strongly influence how human rights can be realized. Particular political institutional contexts have a significant impact on levels of support provided for water, sanitation and hygiene services and the sustainability of access; physical characteristics (water availability, geological, topographical and territorial aspects) are relevant for identifying the most appropriate technologies; economic context influences the implementation capacity of the local institutions and the economic sustainability of systems. Other important influences range from demographic characteristics to gender relations and the socio-cultural context. 2. This report aims to discuss to what extent different types of water, sanitation and hygiene services, combined with their diverse management models, comply with the human rights to water and sanitation. It would be simplistic to isolate this discussion from the context in which certain technologies and management options are applied, and to draw any conclusive generalizations. However, the report seeks to highlight the potential benefits and limitations of each type of service and the resulting concerns for the realization of human rights. Governing bodies and service providers may extract lessons from this analysis for their respective planning, assisting them in developing strategies for the progressive realization of the human rights to water and sanitation. Likewise, these lessons may also aid those bodies responsible for monitoring service provision, especially to identify human rights concerns in access to these services. 3. The report considers three types of services (connections to a piped network, communal and shared facilities and individual on-site solutions) in conjunction with different management models, including utilities; small -scale service providers, with or without a mandate from the State; and self-supply. The realization of the human rights to water and sanitation is influenced by the way in which these different types of service are delivered and the extent to which the State has a role of oversight of the service provided. The report situates this human rights analysis of different types of services in the context of States’ obligations to progressively realize human rights, focussing particularly on prioritization. II. Human rights framework for water, sanitation and hygiene 4. Resolution 24/18 of the Human Rights Council recognized “that the human right to safe drinking water and sanitation entitles everyone, without discrimination, to have access to sufficient, safe, acceptable, physically accessible and affordable water for personal and domestic use and to have physical and affordable access to sanitation, in all spheres of life, that is safe, hygienic, secure and acceptable, and that provides privacy and ensures dignity.” Building on this definition, the earlier work of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (s ee 4/24 15-12500