SUEZ in Africa, positioning itself first and foremost as a partner!

Since the start of its activities in Africa in 1948, with the construction of its first drinking water plant in Sherbine, Egypt, SUEZ has made constant progress in its approach to the continent. Its aim is to support cities and industries in water management and waste recycling and recovery as a partner.

In the water and wastewater sector, over the years the Group has built more than 500 drinking water and wastewater treatment plants serving most of Africa’s capital cities. This is particularly true of Cairo in Egypt, where SUEZ has built several wastewater treatment plants, including the Gabal El Asfar plant on the east bank of the Nile, which has a treatment capacity of 2.5 million m3 of wastewater per day. Or the Alexandria East plant, with a capacity of 800,000 m3 per day. The special feature of these two plants is that they have additional units for the treatment of sewage sludge, generating electricity that makes them up to 65% energy self-sufficient. SUEZ has also managed the drinking water and wastewater services for Algiers in Algeria, and is currently active in drinking water in Senegal. Since 1 January 2020, SEN’EAU, for which SUEZ is the technical partner of reference, has been in charge of producing and distributing drinking water in the country’s urban and peri-urban areas.

On the continent, the Group has also set up decentralized compact units (UCD®) to rapidly meet the drinking water needs of towns with high population growth, islands or isolated towns, adapted to urgent needs and specific local circumstances. On the continent, these solutions have been installed in the cities of Bamako (Mali), Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso), Niamey (Niger) and Yaoundé (Cameroon), as well as in 32 secondary towns in Ivory Coast, totaling more than 40 UCD units to speed up access to water for more than a million Ivorians.

Support for waste management

SUEZ deploys sustainable waste recycling and treatment solutions. In the Moroccan city of Meknes, for example, SUEZ has rehabilitated its household waste storage site and created an innovative green landfill to meet the sustainable development objectives set by the Moroccan authorities. The company is also a leader in industrial waste management, with customers including Renault, PSA, Danone and Siemens. Waste treatment platforms have also been set up in the free trade zones of Tangiers and Kénitra.

In South Africa, the company acquired EnviroServ, the market leader in industrial waste treatment, with operations also in Uganda and Mozambique. With 2,200 employees, EnviroServ covers the entire country and offers a comprehensive range of services for the petrochemicals, manufacturing, metallurgy, energy and mining industries.

While these various achievements have enabled SUEZ to position itself in Africa, they have also confirmed the Group’s leading role in achieving universal water and sanitation coverage on the continent. Some twenty years ago, the company wanted to go further.

Tailor-made technical assistance and transfer of know-how to empower African companies

The Group’s new approach is to focus on tailor-made technical assistance, bringing expertise to the right place. Starting with the end consumer, providing them with quality water in sufficient quantity, accurate metering of the water actually consumed and the option of paying their bill by various means, including digital.

Then we move up the chain to network optimization, via leak detection and repair, connections and pressure management, so that water is not lost in the networks and reaches everyone.

‘Before, the only legacy the Group would leave in an African country was a facility or infrastructure. Today, we are helping to increase the level of expertise of the teams in the local entities that will be operating these infrastructures in the future, so that they can manage them on their own in good conditions and carry out future projects to meet the challenges of tomorrow’, explains François Doussin, SUEZ’s Managing Director for Africa. How can we do this? By developing or complementing local skills to bring them up to the Group’s international standards.

In Algeria, for example, the transfer of skills formed the basis of SUEZ’s work with professionals from the Algiers Water and Sanitation Company (SEAAL) between 2006 and 2021. As part of its management contract with the Algerian state-owned company, SUEZ has increased the skills of local teams, both individually and collectively. Over 200,000 days of training have been given to SEAAL technicians, engineers and managers. This progress has been made possible thanks to the WIKTI® (Water International Knowledge Transfer Initiative) tool. WIKTI® is an innovative and comprehensive management tool for transferring SUEZ know-how to operational teams in the field. It is based on a segmentation of activities (water, wastewater, customer management and also managerial know-how) into 42 basic professions and the assessment of individual and collective initial levels, followed by appropriate training plans.

Training young people in water-related professions in Senegal

In addition to water management in urban and peri-urban areas in Senegal, SUEZ is contributing its expertise to SEN’EAU as part of a ‘School-Company’ sandwich training programme in the fields of plumbing and works maintenance, in particular by drawing on its network of experts to create a dynamic and participate in the creation of an innovative ecosystem made up of operational teams, researchers, academic partners, SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises) and start-ups. The first intake of 30 young people started in March 2021, thanks to a partnership with the Centre sectoriel de formation professionnelle aux métiers du bâtiment et des travaux publics (Sectoral centre for vocational training in building and public works) (CSFP-BTP). After 3 years of training, some of these professionals will join SEN’EAU.

‘We have defined the training needs, implemented the new training modules and supplemented the funding provided by the authorities. However, control remains with the government. Tomorrow, when SUEZ completes its mission, the system we have put in place will stay’, explains François Doussin.

There is also the ‘Water for All’ Chair, co-founded in 2009 by the SUEZ Foundation, Agro-ParisTech and Mines ParisTech, which builds the capacity of water and sanitation professionals in developing countries. The AgroParisTech ‘Suez-Water for All’ Chair delivered its ninth cohort in March 2024 in Paris, France. A total of 39 managers from public, semi-public and private companies, public utilities and supervisory authorities in 17 countries were trained in the various business aspects of a public water and wastewater utility and its global challenges, as well as general management issues.

Future trends…

Demographic growth will increase the need for water and sanitation in Africa, as well as for solid waste management. African companies will need additional expertise to respond more effectively. In this context, current and future projects will also have to include a know-how transfer component.

In the water sector, we can mention the project to strengthen the water supply to the Angolan capital Luanda, where BITA, one of the largest drinking water plants in sub-Saharan Africa, is underway. With a capacity of 260,000 m3 per day, it will serve no fewer than 3.8 million people in the province of Luanda. As part of the project, SUEZ will also train Angolan staff from the state-owned company Empresa Publica de Aguas de Luanda (EPAL) in the long-term operation of the plant.

The Hann Bay wastewater treatment plant project, won by SUEZ and its partner, will also provide local technical expertise in wastewater management to restore water quality. Of the 500 workers on site, 20% are local. Work on the future facility, built as part of the national clean-up project for Hann Bay, is due to be completed in the next few months and will have a capacity of 26,000 m3 per day.