Market brief
Jordan
The authorities that procure water infrastructure in Jordan, how the deals are put together, and what is in the pipeline.
Reference profile for JordanMarket snapshot
The commercial picture in Jordan: the scale of the economy and the water sector, the investment climate, and where the near-term activity is concentrated.
Political stability
World Bank Governance Indicators, 2024. Percentile among all countries; higher is more stable.
Investment climate
World Bank Governance Indicators, 2024. Regulatory quality for private investment; higher is better.
Financing & PPP
- PPP frameworkActive (As-Samra BOT; Aqaba–Amman desalination PPP awarded 2025 to Meridiam/Suez)
- Flagship budgetUS$ 6 bn (Aqaba–Amman carrier)
- Active fundersUSAID, KfW
- Climate adaptation planAdopted (2022)
Opportunities
- Aqaba–Amman desalination & conveyance (National Water Carrier)
- Non-revenue-water reduction PPPs
- Treated-wastewater reuse expansion to 2040
- Solar-powered pumping & smart metering
Key challenges
- Among the world's water-poorest countries (~60 m³/cap)
- Transboundary dependence (Yarmouk, Jordan, Disi)
- Network losses near 50%
- Refugee-driven demand growth
Sources: MWI Water Sector Facts & Figures 2022; National Water Strategy 2023–2040; DOS Jordan; World Bank 2024. Governance indicators: World Bank Worldwide Governance Indicators (2024).
Contracting authorities
The bodies that commission, regulate and operate water infrastructure in Jordan. Ministries set policy and sign the offtake; utilities run the assets; regulators set the tariff and the service standard.
- Ministry of Water & Irrigation (MWI)Ministry
- Aqaba Water CompanyUtility
- MiyahunaUtility
- Water Authority of Jordan (WAJ)Utility
- Yarmouk Water CompanyUtility
- Jordan Valley Authority (JVA)Irrigation & drainage
How deals are structured
The framework in Jordan is Active (As-Samra BOT; Aqaba–Amman desalination PPP awarded 2025 to Meridiam/Suez), the flagship budget line is US$ 6 bn (Aqaba–Amman carrier), and the funders most active in the sector are USAID, KfW, EBRD, Green Climate Fund.
Delivery splits by asset class across the region: dams and trunk conveyance are mostly engineering contracts carried by sovereign or development-bank finance; bulk supply increasingly uses build-operate-transfer concessions against a long-term offtake; and distribution work is let as performance-based contracts paid against measured leakage reduction. The Finance & Economics hub sets out each model and where it has been used.
The projects register bears this out. Of the 23 tracked schemes in Jordan, 1 names a concession structure in the finance note; the rest record only where the money came from, which is not the same as saying they were not concessions.
How to bid
Jordan’s partnership statute is Law No. 19 of 2023, which allows contracts of up to 35 years; the older Law 31 of 2014 and its 2020 amendment are superseded.1 The market’s defining deal is the Aqaba to Amman carrier, where the consortium was appointed in September 2024 and the project agreement signed in January 2025, a sequence worth getting right because both dates are quoted as the award.2
| Procuring body | The Ministry of Water and Irrigation is the contracting authority and signs; the Water Authority of Jordan owns the assets and recommends tariffs to cabinet.24 |
|---|---|
| Contract form and term | Build-own-operate-transfer over 30 years, inside the 35-year statutory cap, with the assets transferring to the government at the end. The lenders describe the same deal as design-build-finance-operate-maintain-transfer, so both labels appear in the documents.231 |
| Offtake counterparty | The government of Jordan, through the water ministry.3 |
| Payment security | State support sits inside the capital structure rather than in a separate guarantee: the carrier is financed through a mix of debt, equity and government subsidies, with a development-finance group around it.23 No published record of arrears to water contractors was found. |
| Tax | Withholding tax at 10% plus the national contribution tax applies to imported services provided by a non-resident legal entity, the rate depending on the recipient’s industry.5 |
| What is coming | Beyond the carrier itself, the ministry and the water authority have an eleven-project readiness programme of bulk water schemes worth about US$840 million: the best-evidenced near-term opportunity set in the country, and absent from most pipelines.2 |
The carrier’s cost is disclosed by its lenders at approximately US$6 billion, subject to further optimisation, with IFC committing US$407 million at a board date of 18 December 2025 and operations planned from 2030.3 What could not be established: the text of Law 19 of 2023 and its 2024 regulation, the partnership unit’s process, dispute forum, governing law, foreign ownership limits and local-content rules. Five Jordanian government domains were unreachable from here.
Regulatory intelligence
For companies entering the market, the regulatory picture matters as much as the resource one. The matrix below tracks the status of the standards and rules that most affect water investment in Jordan.
| Regulation | Status | Year | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Water reuse standards (JS 893) | In force | 2021 | Reclaimed-water quality classes for restricted & unrestricted irrigation. |
| Desalination & brine discharge | Under revision | 2026 | Environmental discharge limits being updated for the National Water Carrier. |
| Groundwater abstraction & wells | In force | 2002 | Licensing and metering of wells; enforcement strengthened since 2013. |
| Water tariffs & cost recovery | Under revision | 2027 | Tariff reform toward cost recovery under the 2023–2040 strategy. |
| Drinking-water quality (JS 286) | In force | 2015 | National drinking-water standard aligned with WHO guidance. |
| ESG / environmental reporting | Draft | 2027 | Environmental & social safeguards required for donor-financed projects. |
| Energy efficiency for water utilities | Draft | 2026 | Solar-pumping and efficiency requirements under discussion. |
Summary of the standards and reforms most relevant to water investment; confirm current requirements with the national regulator (MWI / WAJ / JISM).
Projects
Tracked schemes in Jordan, largest first. Each has its own page with the parties, the finance and a dated history.
23 tracked in total. The full set, filterable, is in the major projects register.
Track record
What has actually been signed in Jordan, from the awards log and the major projects register.
Disclosed value by year
US$ bn of tracked awards in Jordan carrying a published value
1 further awards in this sector carry no published value and are not in the chart.
| Year | Project | Winning firms | US$ m |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | Aqaba–Amman Water Desalination & Conveyance (AAWDC) | Meridiam, SUEZ | 6,000 |
| 2015 on line | Wadi Al Arab Water System II | Özaltın İnşaat | 129 |
| 2013 on line | Disi Water Conveyance (BOT) | GAMA Energy | 988 |
| 2006 on line | As-Samra Wastewater Treatment Plant | Suez Environnement, Infilco Degremont and Morganti, through the Samra Wastewater Treatment Plant Company | n/a |
| 2006 on line | Zara–Ma'in Water Treatment | Joint venture of The Morganti Group and Infilco Degremont | 135 |
Years without a label are award years from the curated log; rows marked on line are dated by commissioning, from the projects register. 5 rows in total for Jordan.
Pipeline & tenders
Structured procurements and live tenders in Jordan, drawn from the same review that maintains the pipeline tracker.
Pipeline & awards
Tenders
Prices
What households pay
| Household tariff (US$/m³) | Cost of supply (US$/m³) | Year | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| $0.31 upward | not published | 2024 | Cabinet decision of 17 September 2023, as reported |
Seven monthly blocks under the restructuring the cabinet approved on 17 September 2023 for 2023 to 2029. The first block, to 6 m³ a month, was JOD 0.218/m³ for water and JOD 0.23 for sanitation in 2024, subsidised at 82% of cost; the subsidy falls block by block and the seventh block, above 42 m³, is not subsidised. Billing moved from quarterly to monthly with the September 2023 bill.
Residential tariffs, and the cost of supply where a utility publishes it, are kept in one place for the whole region so the comparison holds: a tariff means little without the cost it is measured against.
Watch list
What has actually moved in Jordan, dated, from the monthly briefings. Each item names the edition it came from.
- 2026-03AIIB approved US$250 million for the Aqaba to Amman carrier on 25 March, co-financed with EBRD. Financial close is not yet confirmed.August 2026 briefing
The full editions are in the briefing archive.
Sources
10 references
Project, pipeline and tender records are compiled from procurer announcements, lender disclosures and trade reporting; each project page carries its own source and the date it was last checked. Institutions are from the decision-maker directory. Economic and water indicators are cited on the reference profile.
- Jordan Strategy Forum (2025), Public-private partnership: concepts and applications, on Law No. 19 of 2023 and the 35-year cap.
- EBRD and the Ministry of Water and Irrigation (2025), Aqaba-Amman project, environmental and social impact assessment: non-technical summary.
- IFC, summary of investment information, project 47924, disclosed 17 October 2025 and updated 25 February 2026.
- The Jordan Times, “Gov’t approves water, sanitation tariff restructuring 2023-2029”, 17 September 2023 (archived copy; the live page blocks automated reading).
- PwC, Jordan: withholding taxes, worldwide tax summaries.
- FAO, AQUASTAT — Global Information System on Water and Agriculture: country water resources, withdrawals by sector and dam register. fao.org/aquastat. Latest country values as compiled at build.
- World Bank, World Development Indicators and country water-sector reporting. data.worldbank.org.
- Kaufmann & Kraay, Worldwide Governance Indicators (World Bank), 2024 update — political-stability and regulatory-quality scores, 0–100, shown in the market snapshot. worldbank.org/wgi.
- World Resources Institute, Aqueduct 4.0 Water Risk Atlas (2023) — the sub-basin risk, stress and groundwater-decline layers on the interactive maps. wri.org/aqueduct.
- MENA Water Review major projects register and PPP pipeline — compiled from procurer publications, development-bank project pages and trade reporting; each record names its source.
Numbered references are linked from the superscript markers in the text. Figures without a marker come from the sources above as compiled in the site methodology.