WSSD Commits to Clean Water Targets

The commitment by the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) to halve the number of people without access to adequate sanitation by 2015 can significantly improve the health of poor people in the developing world.

The decision to set a target for improving access to sanitation -- mainly in the developing world -- was overwhelmingly supported by countries attending the summit, despite resistance to the idea by the United States among others. Until the announcement yesterday, there were fears that the summit would not be able to agree on a target and timetable to provide sanitation to the world's poor.

It is estimated that 2. billion people -- a third of the world -- lack access to safe sanitation. "This is a lack which affects their health, their dignity their environment, the well-being of their children and the development of their nations, says the executive director of the Water Supply and Sanitation Council, Gourisankar Ghosh.

The council points out that one of the biggest errors in the last 50 years of international development efforts has been the failure to make clean water and safe sanitation and knowledge about hygiene, available across the world.

Illnesses related to a lack of clean water and sanitation cause about five million premature deaths a year -- with more than two million young children dying of disease like cholera and dysentery, annually. "Overall it can be estimated that at any one time almost half of the developing world's people are suffering from diseases associated with a lack of water, sanitation and disease," says the council.

“The partnership is about doubling energy access over the next ten years. It is about reaching another 300 or 400 million people and thousands of entrepreneurs, above current access states. It is about mobilizing other partners to provide better health, in particular to women and children, safe water, better education services, and increased agriculture production and productivity through energy services,” Dominique Lallemente, an energy sector manager with the World Bank told TerraViva.

The lack of access to clean water also costs the developing world in productivity -- with women in rural areas spending a quarter of their time drawing and fetching water, according to estimates from the council. In rural areas the lack of sanitation is also a major environmental threat with the greatest problem not being industrial chemicals, but rather the pollution of soil and water with human waste.

The council believes new technologies have made universal access to clean water and safe sanitation an achievable and affordable goal. In collaboration with governments, community organisations and experts, it has been running the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (Wash) campaign. The campaign is an effort to mobilise the international popular and political commitment that is necessary to make its vision of clean water and safe sanitation for all a reality.