Eighty per cent of the diseases in developing counties are caused by unsafe water and poor sanitation, as well as their inadequate facilities. Open defecation is one of the main causes of diarrhoea, which results in the death of more than 750,000 children below five years annually in the world. Every 20 seconds, a child dies as a result of poor sanitation. The UN estimates that 2.5 billion people of the world still do not use an improved sanitation facility and a little over 1 billion practice open defecation. The observation notes that the situation has not improved significantly in this field. Almost two-thirds, which are about 64 per cent people of the world, use improved sanitation facilities. Since 1990, almost 1.9 billion people have gained access to an improved sanitation facility. The greatest progress has been made in eastern Asia, where sanitation coverage has increased from 27 per cent in 1990 to 67 per cent in 2011. This amounts to more than 626 million people gaining access to improved sanitation facilities over a period of 21 years. However, current trends show that Sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia still struggle with low sanitation coverage. In Sub-Saharan Africa, over 44 per cent of the population uses either shared or ramshackle facilities and an estimated 26 per cent practices open defecation. In southern Asia, the proportion of the population using shared or unimproved facilities has declined to 18 per cent, but open defecation still remains at 39 per cent which is the highest in any region in the globe.
Open defecation rate declined globally from 24 per cent in 1990 to 15 per cent in 2011. This shows a drop of 244 million people to 1.04 billion in 2011. Eastern Asian, Southeast Asian and the Latin American and Caribbean regions have seen a steady decline since the early surveys describing the conditions in 1990.The Millennium Development Goal target is to halve by 2015 the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation. The world remains behind track in meeting the MDG sanitation target by 75 per cent, and if the current trends continue, it means more than half a billion people will miss the target. Unless the pace of change in the sanitation sector is accelerated, the MDG target may not be reached until 2026.
Facilities ensuring hygienic separation of human excreta from human contact include: flush or pour-flush of toilets/latrines to a piped sewer system, a septic tank or a pit-latrine, ventilated improved pit-latrine, pit-latrine with slab.
A total of 2.5 billon people, roughly 37 per cent of the world's population, still lack what many of us take for granted. The Sanitation Drive to 2015 is an advocacy campaign launched to meet the Millennium Development Goal sanitation target, putting an end to open defecation. The campaign supports and inspires people from around the world to take action towards achieving sanitation and hygiene for all by targeting the poorest and most vulnerable people. UN Deputy Secretary General's call to action on sanitation recognises greater progress in sanitation, which is essential for fighting poverty and achieving all MDGs. Â
In Bangladesh,  a new approach towards increasing sanitation coverage, called community-led total sanitation (CLTS), was introduced in a small village in Rajshahi district in 2000 by Dr. Kamal Kar in cooperation with WaterAid Bangladesh and the Village Education Resource Centre (VERC). Until then, most of the traditional sanitation programmes relied on the provision of subsidies for the construction of latrines and hygiene education. Under a new framework, the subsidised facilities became expensive and often did not reach all the members of a community. This situation led to the development of the CLTS approach in Bangladesh, shifting the focus on to personal responsibility and low-cost solutions. CLTS aims to totally stop open defecation within a community, coming away from the concept of facilitating improved sanitation only for selected households. Campaigns for the awareness of the unhealthy practice of open defecation and its severe impact in terms of hygiene went on simultaneously in the vulnerable areas. In the poorest households, low-cost toilets are promoted, and constructed with local materials. The purchase of the facility is not subsidised, so that every household must finance its own toilets. At the same time, CLTS had spread in at least six countries in Asia, and three in Africa. In 2009, the UN Special Rapporteur for the human rights to water and sanitation noted that "the experience of Bangladesh has positively influenced countries in other regions of the world and has instilled confidence in the belief that low-cost sanitation is possible."
 The ideal share of population with access to an improved water source was estimated at 98 per cent in 2004, a very high level for a low-income country. This has been achieved to a large extent through the construction of hand-pumps with the support of external donors. However, in 1993 it was discovered that groundwater, the source of drinking water for 97 per cent of the rural population and a significant share of the urban population, is in many cases naturally contaminated with arsenic. It gradually emerged that 70 million people were drinking water, which exceeded the WHO guideline of 10 microgrammes of arsenic per litre, and 30 million were drinking water containing more than the Bangladesh National Standard of 50 microgrammes per litre, leading to poisoning.
Sanitation faces its own set of challenges, with only 56 per cent of the population estimated to have been having access to adequate sanitation facilities in 2010. A new approach to improvement in sanitation coverage in rural areas, the community-led total sanitation concept --- that has been first introduced in Bangladesh, is credited with having contributed significantly to the increase in sanitation coverage since 2000.The government of Bangladesh hosted the South Asian Conference on Sanitation with a view to assessing the state of sanitation and hygiene, sharing experience and lessons learnt, raising the profile of sanitation and hygiene in South Asia, generating political commitment through a joint declaration and strengthening leadership for improved sanitation.
Despite all these positive approaches initiated by the government of Bangladesh, a huge number of slum people have still been deprived of pure drinking water and are facing the worst type of sanitation. Discouraging migration from rural areas to the cities might be the hidden agenda for any government in the developing countries in addressing the problem. It is also true that quite a big number of people can be given safe drinking water and improved sanitation facilities through the clustered system of slums. In villages, tube-wells can somehow ensure drinking water, but the sanitation is still in poor shape. It is a great challenge on the part of the government to ensure it. Just raising awareness among the individuals can ensure success at a significant level. Of course, at village markets and other assemblages the arrangement of pure drinking water and improved sanitation can be put in place under projects with govt-NGO cooperation, which will offer benefits to millions.
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The writer is Programme Manager, BRAC Education Programme, and vice-president, Bangladesh English Language Teachers Association (BELTA).
Email: masumbillah65@gmail.com
Place of Bangladesh in global sanitation graph
Masum Billah | Published: April 05, 2014 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2024 06:01:00
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