Being able to supply water to meet the country’s needs is just one part of the challenge. In order to ensure the sustainability of water usage, water conservation is a much required aspect in many countries including Singapore to manage demand for water. Most of the people living in Singapore are middle class and above, which means that pricing strategy will have limited effect in curbing excessive water usage, and that brings us to leveraging on human psychology in conservation. Let’s explore how well Singapore has handled water conservation campaigns and the psychology behind them.
Utility Bill Sample
If we look at the bill sample for utilities in Singapore (above), you can see that there is a category for Water Conservation Tax. This means that those who are below middleclass, who conserve water so as to pay less, will pay very little or no tax, while those above middle class who can afford to pay more and does not conserve their water usage will face a higher tax. This pricing strategy ensures that the price reflect the true value of how much a person is willing to pay for the water, and everyone has a threshold to what they are willing to pay per unit of goods, due to the maximization tendency in some people(Schwartz et al., 2002). Although pricing strategy doesn’t generally work well due to water bills amounting to a very small proportion of disposable income (Martinez-Espineira & Nauges, 2004), nobody likes to be a sucker that pays more than others on the same product, especially in “Kiasu”(afraid to lose) Singapore. They also leverage on people’s conformity to social norms (Nolan et al,2008) by comparing their bills to the national average, which is proven to elicit a reduction of usage around 11-20% (Allcott, 2011).
Even though the above strategies works pretty well, pricing strategy will only work on some people, especially those below middle income and those with kiasu attitude and/or maximization tendency, while providing an average for comparison might backfire if the whole nation increases its consumption. This is why Singapore organizes water conservation campaigns and also water rationing drills to educate the public on water conservation, and these policies tend to be more supported in areas with highly educated population (Salvaggio et al, 2014).
Water conservation awareness program (http://www.pub.gov.sg/conserve/WACProgramme/Pages/default.aspx)
Singapore world water day (http://www.singaporeworldwaterday.com/about.htm)
Water rationing exercise in Buangkok (http://news.asiaone.com/News/AsiaOne+News/Singapore/Story/A1Story20110613-283711.html)
To further the water conservation effort, it is best to encourage the population to purchase water efficient appliances and equipment to be used in the household, but due to the difficulty of switching in terms of price, current appliances’ lifespan and technical skills, HDB is now equipping new households with water conserving equipment in places such as the Ponggol Eco-Town.
On a Macro Level, higher education and home ownership significantly increase the likelihood of the population supporting water policies (Salvaggio et al, 2014), and providing safe and stable environment promotes identity formation within the population, which leads to high support of country’s policies including water conservation policies, as well as the conservation of available common resources. Because Singapore has been a proponent of an educated and skilled workforce and provides house ownership schemes such as the CPF Housing Grant and Home Protection Scheme, Singaporeans tend to be able to anchor their identity with the country and be more understanding of the problems we face and the policies put in place. This plays a crucial role in making Singapore’s water conservation strategies a success.