Bank of France governor Michel Camdessus told a UN food agency meeting here Wednesday that an extra $100 billion a year in assistance was needed to provide clean, safe water for developing countries.
Camdessus, a former managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), said 1.1 billion people in developing countries were currently without steady supplies of clean, safe water.
Responsibility for its delivery rested with developing countries and the most important thing they could do was create a water policy, he said.
"We may have lost a battle against hunger," Camdessus told a UN food security committee meeting in Rome, "but we have not lost the war".
"We have available many resources and strategies we have not used sufficiently so far."
Developing countries should report publicly on how they intend to achieve the Millennium Development Goals adopted by UN member states in 2000, he said, urging them to establish transparent governance.