Estruturação de problemas no sistema de abastecimento de água de Maceió – AL

Abstract

Most decision-making processes occur in the context of a system, although the world is not a perfect system but problematic with unstructured problems, which often turn difficult the decision-making process making it complex. In the Maceió-AL Water Supply System the neighborhoods are divided into 3 macro zones with different water sources, making the population origin of divergent problematic situations, inadditiontopublicinterestthesystem also involves the interests of public and private organizations. The present study was conducted between August 2019 and July 2020 and aimed to understand the Maceió-AL water supply scenario, for this, Soft Systems Methodology was used, a methodology where problematic situations are investigated and organized on a system to identify objectives and support decisions, 4 SSM’s stages were applied: 1. Unstructured problem study; 2. Rich Picture creation; 3. Root definitions creation; 4. Conceptual Model creation.Two main actors were identified in the system, the Alagoas Sanitation Company (Companhia de Saneamento de Alagoas - CASAL) responsible for the water supply, and the Government of the State of Alagoas, CASAL’s majority shareholder, with spheres responsible for construction, resources and system taxes regularization. Through the content analysis of journalistic news about the water supply system from the year 2017 until 2019 were identified as main problematic situations: water losses in distribution, lack of supply stability, and non-compliance with maintenance and constructions on the proper time. In the scenario of system problems comprehension and structuring the use of the actuals SSM stages proved to be enough, however, despite the creation of objectives and actions alternatives have beendone,agreater stakeholder involvement could lead the study to different objectives, there is also the necessity to integrate these wage system into the study due to the interconnection between the systems and the percentage of beneficiaries. Despite the time between the study's completion and publication, and the structural changes under gone in the system due to the water distribution concession, the problematic situations persist, making the study also a source of decisionaid for the concessionary company.