World Water Day: space tool aids fight for clean drinking water

According to the UN, safe drinking water remains inaccessible for about 1.1
billion people in the world. To address this global dilemma, the UN Millennium
Development pledged at the World Summit in Johannesburg in 2002 to reduce by
half the proportion of people without access to safe drinking water by 2015.

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http://www.esa.int/esaEO/SEM9J4OVGJE_economy_0.html

WITH GRIM STATISTICS AND MESSAGE OF HOPE, UN MARKS WORLD WATER DAY

New York, Mar 22 2006 11:00AM

The United Nations marked <"http://www.worldwaterday.org/">World Water Day today
with calls for more equitable distribution and efficient use of a scarce
resource; a grim reminder that 6,000 people, mostly children, die every day from
dirty water; and a message of hope for one of the planet’s poorest regions,
Africa, springing from its rich potential for irrigation.

“Let us recognize the
<"http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2006/sgsm10378.doc.htm">cultural,
environmental and economic importance of clean water, and strengthen our efforts
to protect rivers, lakes and aquifers,” Secretary-General Kofi Annan
<"http://www.un.org/apps/sg/sgstats.asp">said in a message.

“We need to distribute water more equitably, and increase the efficiency of
water use, especially in agriculture. Let us mount a sustained effort - among
international bodies, Governments and local communities, and across traditions
and cultures - that will reach our goals.”

Mr. Annan warned that water continues to be wasted and degraded all over the
world, in cities and rural areas alike, citing the grim statistics: 18 per cent
of the world’s population lack access to safe drinking water; 40 per cent lack
basic sanitation; every day, some 6,000 people, most of them children, die from
water-related causes.

With 852 million chronically hungry people in the world today and a global
population expected to increase by 2 billion people by 2030, the UN Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO) stressed that reducing hunger will only be
possible if agricultural yields are significantly increased, and increased
production will depend largely on investment in irrigation.

“Underused water resources in parts of Africa offer great potential for
irrigation, especially using simple and inexpensive technologies,” it said in a
statement, noting that. Africa uses less than 6 per cent of its renewable water
resources, compared with 20 per cent in Asia. Only 7 percent of arable land in
Africa is irrigated, compared with 38 per cent in Asia.

Small-scale irrigation and drainage works carried out at the rural community
level using local labour offer an effective, low-cost option. “Carefully
designed water management strategies and programmes aimed at improving the
efficiency and productivity of water use need to be put in place,” Pasquale
Steduto, Chief of FAO’s Water Resources, Development and Management Service,
said.

In Bangkok, the Executive Secretary of the UN Economic and Social Commission for
Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), Kim Hak-Su, noted that although the region has the
highest economic growth rates in the world, it also has the lowest per-capita
fresh water availability, and the highest number of people living below the
poverty line.

“Over 600 million people live without access to safe drinking water and without
appropriate sanitation,” he told a meeting on the future of the region’s water
resources today, noting that last year per capita water availability was about
3,400 cubic metres (m3) per annum, while the world average was estimated at
7,600 m3 per annum.

Furthermore, in 2005 Asia was home to 71 per cent of the total number of people
in the world without access to improved sanitation, 58 per cent of those without
access to safe water and 56 per cent of the world’s undernourished.

2006-03-22 00:00:00.000

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For more details go to UN News Centre at http://www.un.org/news