ABSTRACT
Access to essential public services, including safe drinking water, healthcare, energy, roads, transportation, sanitation or environmental services, is a key condition for leading a life in human dignity and well-being.1 Access to basic services in a reliable, affordable and adequate manner lies at the core of fostering healthy, inclusive and sustainable societies. It is no doubt for this reason that the United Nations’ ‘Sustainable Development Goals’ now stress the need to:
[. . .] by 2030 ensure that all men and women, particularly the poor and the vulnerable, have equal rights to economic resources, as well as access to basic services, ownership, and control over land and other forms of property, inheritance, natural resources, appropriate new technology, and financial services including microfinance.2
