Water Poverty: How to combat it (from the WHO)

DEVASTATION: This startling picture of the White House, by Saddington & Baynes for WaterAid and End Water Poverty, marks a meeting of 30 nations to discuss the problem of water poverty.

Four days after my last post discussing water and oil, the World Health Organisation released its annual sanitation and drinking water report.

"There is no doubt that if ministers and leaders had to endure these conditions in their own backyard they would take immediate action. Today they have the opportunity to do so and help bring an end to this scandalous crisis." - Barbara Frost (on Stuff)

The Global Annual Assessment of Sanitation and Drinking-Water (GLAAS) (warning, 23.7 MB)

The report found that diarrhoeal disease in children has a greater impact than malaria, tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS combined. Improving sanitation and drinking water could reduce the death of 2.2 million children a year. Sanitation would save a lot of money for these developing countries. Money that could be spent on healthcare, food, protection and education. There is four reccomendations in it:

Recommendation 1 - Developing countries and external support agencies to demonstrate greater political commitment to sanitation and drinking-water, given their central role in human and economic development.

Reccomendation 2 - External support agencies and developing countries to consider how to better target resources to accelerate progress towards meeting the sanitation and drinking-water MDG(Millenium Development Goal) target.

Reccomendation 3 - Developing countries and external support agencies to strengthen national and subnational systems to plan, implement and monitor the delivery of sanitation and drinking-water services, especially to unserved populations.

Reccomendation 4 - All stakeholders to work in partnership to support the development and implementation of national plans for sanitation and drinkingwater, using their particular skills and resources and aligning with national systems.

So what do these reccomendations mean? What are supporting agencies, stakeholders, subnational plans and the MDG target? Do these words really mean anything? Let's have a look. Specifically at page 70, where they expand on these reccomendations. However instead of writing in UN english, I'll be writing in plain english or at least trying to.

Recommendation 1 - There needs to be a bigger commitment to clean and drinkable water. Specifically from developing countries and any supporting agencies like the Red Cross or United Nations Development program. This is because water's essential for health and their businesses. Here's how you do it:

• Increase money and effort into sanitation and getting more drinkable water. This is done through developing countries and external support agencies, like the ones mentioned. (R1a)
• Find how much resources(eg. money, volunteers, vehicles) you need for drinking water and sanitation compared to other social services. This way you can use them more efficiently. For instance, if your village has two cars available, use one to pick clean water up early in the morning from the well. Then use it to do whatever the village needs done the rest of the day. Have the other one reserved as an ambulance. (R1b)
• Convince the people affected by water poverty, mostly the government and citizens, that having more drinking water and sanitation will boost the economy. That it's worth working towards. (R1c)

Reccomendation 2 - Think of how to use resources more effectively. This is so a country can reduce by half people without access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation(Millenium Development Goal). This means:

• Have your highest authorities discuss resources available for basic sanitation and drinking water for people without access to them. (R2a)
• Measure your progress on reducing the people without clean water and basic sanitation by half. Have set goals per year. It's a bit like going on a diet. You're a 160 kg overweight man trying to get down to 80 kg. For your first year you aim to lose 10 kg, a year after that 15 kg etc until you're down to 80. (R2b)

Reccomendation 3 - Strengthen national and regional systems to plan, implement and monitor the delivery of clean drinking water and sanitation. Make sure this is done especially for people without access to clean water and sanitation.

• In country development plans, make sure there are clear roles in institutes responsible for delivering sanitation and drinking water. The leading institutions and roles are accountable for delivery. This gives a clear frame work to work in and wont cause confusion. (R3a)
• Make sure that accurate and reliable data is available for regions. This means nobody's slacking off or making up figures. (R3b)
• Prepare and implement plans to use people available who will get sanitation and clean drinking water. This means who will be cleaners, water deliverers and who'll be responsible for maintaining certain facilities. (R3c)

Reccomendation 4 - A partnership of people with the needed skills and resources to implementing national clean drinking water plans.

• Have external support agencies find ways to deliver clean water and sanitation. Let them partner with investors wanting economical benefits or organisations that have money to support them. Don't reveal who they are. Their role is to give money and follow their legal contract to give it. (R4a)
• Have the countries and citizens work with external support agencies to lower by half people without clean water or sanitation. (R4b)

Of course these are only reccomendations. Some developing countries might try something completely different. But I hope these developing countries will get access to clean and safe drinking water. It will be a cornerstone for peace. For more information on Water Poverty, you can check out the WHO's booklet: The Right to Water

“Access to safe water is a fundamental human need and, therefore, a basic human right. Contaminated water jeopardizes both the physical and social health of all people. It is an affront to human dignity.” - Kofi Annan, United Nations Secretary-General.

Peak Oil VS Peak Water

I hear about Peak Oil. There is growing concerns that the world will not meet its energy supply needs. It seems to me that we have a much bigger problem on our hands. Humanity's water supply is limited right now. But let's compare Oil and Water first.

Let's look at Oil first.



Oil

How much do we have?

According to the US Government's Energy Information Administration, at least 1184.208 to 1238.892 billion barrels of oil. Infact according to the International Energy Agency: "The world’s energy resources are adequate to meet the projected demand increasethrough to 2030 and well beyond." In 2006 we were consuming 30 billion barrels a year. Of course I'm not saying we own the earth(Private property is theft rar rar. Just kidding.). I'm talking about the oil we have available.

So why the fuss?

Well, according Kjell Aleklett(Professor of Physics at Uppsala University, Sweden, and President of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas): "The oil industry and IEA accept the fact that the total production from existing oil fields is declining."(World Watch 2006, p. 10) As well as this, the US military says our surplus oil production capacity could disappear as early as 2015. This means while we have lots of oil, we aren't able to get to it enough to meet our needs.

The use of oil also contributes to the widely academically accepted fact of man-influenced climate change. As well as this the oil we mostly have is in countries with a track record of corrupt government.

























Now I think we need to eventually switch to an alternative. But right now there's just not anything like oil to help us. We need it for our ships, our planes, cars and buses.

So what can be done?

Well I think we can do quite a bit. We could invest more money into energy research instead of war. We can make use of economical vehicles. Yeah this is pretty basic.

So here's something complicated: "[Government] Policy[s] should impose a large Btu or carbon tax on energy that is phased in over a long period, perhaps 20 years. This would signal entrepreneurs that there will be a market for alternative energies. Furthermore, increases in the energy tax should be offset by reducing other taxes, such as payroll or corporate taxes. Economic studies show that such an approach can generate a win-win solution—reduce energy use (and the environmental damages not paid by users), stimulate research and development on alternative energies, and speed economic growth."

So what is Rober Kaufmann(World Watch 2006, p. 20-21)(Professor in the center for Energy & Enviornment studies at Boston University) saying? Make a oil tax that slowly increases over a 20 year period. At the same time, personal and business taxes would slowly be reduced. Entrepreneurs will try to make alternative economical fuels or very economical engines, hoping to get rich. It'll be win win for both of us. Personally, I'd prefer for governments to do the research. If there's an alternative energy business monopoly it could screw everybody over. It could be more expensive than oil, though more enviornmentally friendly. However this is something we could do.

Now let's look at water.



Water

How much do we have?

They say if aliens discovered earth, they wouldn't call it earth. They'd call it water. That's because at least 70% of the earths surface is covered in water.

So what's the fuss?

Canada's Enviornment Department says our drinkable rivers, aquifer and lakes are limited. They are 2.5% of the water in the world. It's scattered and not everybody has access to it. Over 1 in 6 people don't have access to safe drinking water. Nearly 5/12 people have no water sanitation (UN 2005). As well as this, 2/3 people could face water scarcity in the next 20 years due to political and climate issues. (UN 2009)

So what can be done?

The World Health Organisation states that a clean water supply and sanitation is one of the greatest things we can do to reduce poverty. Infact they state for every dollar put into drinkable water and sanitation, we would achieve a return of 3 to 34 dollars. That's a 1:3-34 cost to benefit ratio. The cost of drinkable water and sanitation is $11.3 billion a year. Considering the world has around 2.5 billion people without proper sanitation, that would be $4.52 per person. $4.52 a year to give someone a basic necessity of human life (WHO 2005, p. 32). United Nations Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro has also warned we need to insure we have integral ecosystems. This "means promoting peaceful collaboration in the sharing of water resources, particularly in the case of boundary and transboundary water resources.” (UN 2009)

Now let's draw a conclusion.


I think we could live in a country where oil is strictly regulated if we end up with not much oil. It would annoy us at first but we could adjust. I doubt we'll be doing that however. It's too authoritarian for peoples tastes. But the fact is oils likely to get more expensive. I don't think we could live without water. One of my biggest fears is that we will neglect the issue of accessible drinkable water in favour of looking for alternative energy. Political corruption and terrorism is affecting humanitys supply of water. Lack of water is affecting humanity far more right now than a lack of oil.

"Human ingenuity is one resource that won’t peak—but whether it can be mobilized quickly enough to surmount these challenges is not yet clear." - Christopher Flavin, President of the Worldwatch Institute.

They say a picture's worth a thousand words.

Credit goes to Joel Pett, who drew this for USA Today