Water and sanitation for all: where are we now?

In 2000, over a billion people lacked access to safe water and 2.4 billion lacked access to adequate sanitation facilities. Although most developing countries are moving in the right direction, many are lagging. Review of progress suggests that with political commitment, the right policies and modest allocations of finance, the global targets for safe water, sanitation and hygiene awareness can be met.

Water, adequate sanitation and good levels of hygiene arebasic human rights. The Millennium Development Goal (MDG) for water is to halvethe proportion of the world’s population without sustainable access to safedrinking water by 2015. The World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburgin 2002 and the Vision 21 report in 2000 set similar targets for improvingaccess to adequate sanitation facilities and raising knowledge of basichygiene. Individual countries areexpected to apply these targets on a national level, and if they choose, alsowithin regions.

Drawing on work in the UN and various research institutes, apaper from the Institute of DevelopmentStudies in the UKoutlines the prospects of achieving the global targetsfor 2015 and lists key issues to be addressed by donors and national policy makers.

Key findings include:

• About half the developing world’s population livein countries currently on track to meet the 2015 targets.
• Given the size of their populations, success in Chinaand India willbe key to achieving the worldwide goals. Each is ontrack to achieve the MDG for safe water, but both need to double their currentrate of improvement for sanitation facilities.
• South Africais the only country in sub-Saharan Africa which hasachieved the MDG on safe water, which shows what governments can achieve inthis area when there is strong political will.

The global targets for the MDG on safe water and the goals forimproved sanitation and practice of basic hygiene are challenging, butcountries in all regions have shown that rapid progress is possible. Ingeneral, the goals are within the grasp of most countries and communities,providing there is serious commitment to community action and reasonableallocation of resources.

Specifically, the author recommends that policy makers andgovernments focus on:

• widespread social and community involvement andaction to mobilise additional finances and labour, with an emphasis on theinvolvement of women in planning, management and community action
• increased use of simple low-cost technologiesand approaches
• better monitoring of progress with more publicdissemination of results
• a role for private sector involvement in waterand sanitation provision, in particular for small-scale local craftsmen and businesses
• a pragmatic, politically acceptable and equitableapproach to charging for water and sanitation services
• directing resources torural areas and the poorest urban areas; governments should direct 20 percentof total budgetary expenditures and donors should direct 20 percent of total aidto the provision of basic services to generate the financial resources requiredto achieve the goals in these priority areas.