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Ce jeu montre à quel point il est difficile d’assurer une distribution efficace de l’eau en Asie centrale.

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Water for People – When water isn’t a matter of course

Energie

Every day, 6000 children under the age of five die because of poor hygiene and polluted water – 6000 daily deaths which could be prevented. For the SDC, strengthening institutional capability and developing human resources is a priority, so it backs projects with a potentially positive influence on national and regional strategies that impact on two mainstays of all socio-economic development: drinking water and sanitation.

Key facts
• Drinking water shortages and the lack of sanitation alone are responsible for 80% of the diseases prevalent in developing countries.
• Every year, 1.8 million children die from diarrhoea due to lack of water and poor hygiene.
• 800 million people worldwide do not have access to drinking water, and 1.7 billion do not have regular access to clean water or to sanitary facilities.
• 2.6 billion people have no access to basic sanitation systems.

Millennium Development Goal No. 7 advocates halving the number of people with no access to drinking water or basic sanitation by 2015. Will we manage to achieve this Goal? The current view is that it can still be done, though the situation is deteriorating. If it continues to do so, the sanitation target will not be met for over half a billion people.

Reversing this downward trend means working twice as hard, as of now. Commitment to drinking water and sanitation requires joint efforts by civil society and public- and private-sector players. If we fail to fulfil the MDG 7 contract, we will also miss the Goals for health, education, the environment and poverty.

Preventing waste and pollution in the most fragile areas
 That is why numerous NGO, community and local government projects aim not only to expand access to adequate supplies of good-quality drinking water but also to ensure appropriate sanitation and waste management. Improving the sustainability of existing services already plays a very important part in attaining these objectives. Inadequate maintenance and flawed management of water-supply systems and sanitary installations result in considerable waste and increased environmental pollution, while water shortages and restricted, inequitable access trigger public health problems and conflicts. The prevalence of flawed services and extreme poverty are at the root of acute water and sanitation problems in rural areas and small towns.

The SDC focus – Demand and private-sector participation

SDC activities give priority to rural areas and small towns but may also be extended to certain deprived urban areas through pilot projects.

The Agency responds to demand, an approach which – at local level – involves close cooperation with the private sector and the authorities, as the only guarantors of the right of access to water. Once clearly defined regulations are in place, the private sector can be involved without risk for the users. In this way, the capabilities of the “water sector” as a whole are reinforced, generating not only new revenue but also encouraging greater decentralisation. Banking on the development of an environment that facilitates private-sector participation, the SDC advocates a regulation system which favours small providers.

To support sustainable drinking-water, sanitation and waste-disposal strategies and measures, the SDC participates in the tripartite political dialogue between government, the private sector and civil society at both international and national level.

The Agency is making every effort to step up its influence by joining its partners’ steering committees, groups of experts and privileged networks, such as the Water and Sanitation Programme (WSP), the Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC) and the Global Water Partnership (GWP).

 

thomas.zeller@deza.admin.ch
francois.muenger@deza.admin.ch

Additional Information and Documents