Some 2.6b people worldwide have no access to sanitation
Sunday, 23 March 2008
FE Report
Some 2.6 billion people worldwide do not have access to sanitation, and to raise awareness for this crisis, this year's World Water Day will focus on sanitation.
Worldwide, about 1.7 million deaths per year, 90 per cent of which are children, are attributed to unsafe water, poor sanitation and hygiene, and caused mainly by infectious diarrhoea, according to a World Bank (WB) report.
Access to sanitation, practice of good hygiene, and a safe water supply could save 1.5 million children a year.
As the world's largest investor in sanitation and wastewater, the WB helps to improve sanitation services that generate economic benefits, and also reduce illness and environmental squalor that directly harm people around the globe.
For the past 30 years, WSP, a multi-donor partnership of the WB, has led or supported many of the advances made within the water and sanitation sector.
In only 14 years, more than one billion people have gained access to sanitation. But because of population growth, the rate of sanitation provision needs to be doubled to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
Sanitation and wastewater commitments have effectively tripled since 1990 and nearly doubled since 2002. This growth reflects increasing client concern, the effects of the MDGs, and the efforts of the WB staff to raise the profile of sanitation and wastewater with clients, the report added.
Some 2.6 billion people worldwide do not have access to sanitation, and to raise awareness for this crisis, this year's World Water Day will focus on sanitation.
Worldwide, about 1.7 million deaths per year, 90 per cent of which are children, are attributed to unsafe water, poor sanitation and hygiene, and caused mainly by infectious diarrhoea, according to a World Bank (WB) report.
Access to sanitation, practice of good hygiene, and a safe water supply could save 1.5 million children a year.
As the world's largest investor in sanitation and wastewater, the WB helps to improve sanitation services that generate economic benefits, and also reduce illness and environmental squalor that directly harm people around the globe.
For the past 30 years, WSP, a multi-donor partnership of the WB, has led or supported many of the advances made within the water and sanitation sector.
In only 14 years, more than one billion people have gained access to sanitation. But because of population growth, the rate of sanitation provision needs to be doubled to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
Sanitation and wastewater commitments have effectively tripled since 1990 and nearly doubled since 2002. This growth reflects increasing client concern, the effects of the MDGs, and the efforts of the WB staff to raise the profile of sanitation and wastewater with clients, the report added.