Some 1.4 billion people in the world, primarily in Asia and Africa, have no access to clean water while 2.6 billion have no basic sanitary system, according to Jamal Saghir, the head of water issues at the World Bank.

Three million children die each year because they have no clean drinking water, he added.

Saghir said water management, seen as the key to fighting poverty and promoting economic growth, must be synonymous with sustainable development.

"The World Bank will not grant loans to projects that don't respect the rules" of international development, he warned, stressing the importance of prioritizing the funding of supply services over infrastructure.

"Why have pipes if they are empty," he said.

Swedish Environment Minister Lena Sommestad also insisted on the need to focus on long-term goals.

"Democracy is also an important aspect and women must be involved," she said.

Meanwhile, Sunita Narain, whose Indian environmental organization The Center for Science and Environment won this year's 150,000-dollar (114,000-euro) Stockholm Water Prize for its work to improve water management, stressed that a country's level of development must be considered when finding solutions.

Narain, an ardent promoter of rainwater harvesting in her native country, told the conference that the Western model was not necessarily the best solution for other countries.

"It is not enough to tell us 'build the infrastructures and bring in the private sector'. The water problem is more complicated. Please do not give us easy answers," she said.

She said India was too big a country to have just one solution, and local authorities must be able to resolve their own regional specific needs.

"We can't afford the modern (sewage) system."

Narain said water held the key to future growth in India and said it woild become evermore crucial as the country becomes increasingly urbanised.

Currently 30 percent of India's population lives in urban areas, a figure which is expected to grow to 50 percent in 30 to 50 years.

Some 75 to 80 percent of the Indian subcontinent's water is currently used in the agriculture sector, compared to just four to five percent for municipal supplies, with the remainder being used by industry, she noted.

South Africa's Water and Forestry Minister B. Patience Sonjica said meanwhile that water storage solutions needed to be found for the African continent, pointing out that stored water represents just a small portion of the water drunk in Africa compared to 80 percent in rich countries.

According to Saghir, the proportion of people on Earth who do not have access to clean water is roughly the same as those who do not have access to electricity.

But the total investment needed each year for water supply and treatment is around 30 billion dollars, or four times less than that what is needed for electricity.

This week's conference gathers some 1,200 experts from 100 countries until Friday.

Questions of infrastructure, coping with climate issues, water in agriculture, land degradation and water pollution are on the programme.

Seminars range from one about cities and water use - "The political economy of defecation" - to how to improve the marketing of better toilets, and whether mass installation of dams has been beneficial or harmful.

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