Discrepancies between National and International Data on Improved Drinking Water and Sanitation : Bangladesh Experience

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Discrepancies between National and International
Dataon Improved Drinking Water and Sanitation
Bangladesh Experience

• By
• A Y M Ekamul Hoque
• Director General
• Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics

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1. Introduction

• Among the Eight Millennium Development Goals
  (MDG) Goal -7 is Ensuring Environmental
  Sustainability.
• This goal has two targets of which target no-2
  (Target 10 of MDG Targets) is to halve by 2015
  the proportion of people without sustainable
  access to safe drinking water and sanitation.
• This target has two important indicators. These
  are as follows

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2. Concept and Definition used in Bangladesh

• Indicator 7.8 Proportion of population using
  an improved drinking water source
• Indicator 7.9 Proportion of population using
  improved sanitation facility.
• The variation with respect to national and
  international data on improved drinking water
  source and sanitation system occurs mainly due to
  concept and definition used in the Censuses and
  Surveys.

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2. Concept and Definition used in Bangladesh
(cont.)

• The concepts and definition used in different
  census and surveys varies in the context of
  Bangladesh particularly in case of sanitation
  facility.
• In case of drinking water the definition used in
  the multiple indicator cluster survey (MICS)
  conducted by UNICEF and BBS, 2006 is as follows

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Improved Drinking water

• The population using improved sources of
  drinking water are those with any of the
  following types of water supply
• piped water (into dwelling yard or plot),
• public tap/standpipe,
• tube well/borehole,
• protected well,
• protected spring and
• rain water collection.
• Bottled water is considered as an improved water
  source only if the household is using it for
  other purpose also such as hand washing and
  cooking.

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Improved Sanitation

• The MICS 2006 used the following sanitation
  facilities as improved flash toilet connected to
  sewerage system, septic tanks and pit latrines,
  ventilated improved pit latrines and pit latrine
  with slabs and composting toilets.

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3. Arsenic contamination in tube well water

• In the recent year, arsenic contamination of
  ground water remains as a significant issue for
  Bangladesh.
• The level of arsenic that has been considered as
  unsafe in the context of Bangladesh is 0.05 mg/l.
  
• MICS survey was conducted in July-September 2006
  when the testing of all tube wells for arsenic
  contamination was not completed.
• However, MICS survey asked the households whether
  their tube well was tested for arsenic.

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Table I Tube wells tested/marked for arsenic
contamination, 2006
Residence Tube wells Tested for Arsenic Tube wells Tested for Arsenic Tube wells Tested for Arsenic Tube wells Tested for Arsenic Total
Residence Not tested Tested/marked red Tested marked green Missing Total
National 37.5 7.7 54.6 0.2 100.00
Rural 33.8 9.1 56.9 0.2 100.00
Urban 48.0 3.8 48.0 0.3 100.00
Division
Barisal 26.0 1.1 72.7 0.2 100.00
Chittagong 41.3 17.2 41.3 0.2 100.00
Dhaka 32.3 7.6 59.9 0.3 100.00
Khulna 20.1 8.6 71.0 0.2 100.00
Rajshahi 55.6 2.8 41.5 0.2 100.00
Sylhet 34.4 4.1 61.1 0.4 100.00
Source MICS- 2006, Volume 1 Technical Report,
page-55
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3. Arsenic contamination in tube well water
(cont.)

• In response around 62 reported that their tube
  wells were tested for arsenic contamination and
  the rest 38 mentioned that their tube well was
  not tested for arsenic contamination.
• The MICS 2006 report mentioned 97.6 households
  with improved source of drinking water which did
  not consider arsenic contamination.
• If arsenic contamination is considered the
  percentage of improved source will be less.

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4. Data on drinking water obtained from BBS and
MDG website.

• Table-2 below shows data obtained from the MDG
  website and that has been supplied by BBS.
• It may be noted that the data supplied by BBS has
  not been adjusted for arsenic contamination.
• Therefore, the variation in the two sources are
  well pronounced.
• Table 2 Improved Drinking water sorce,
  Bangladesh 1990-2006.

Data source 1990 1995 2000 2006
MDG web site 78 78 79 80
BBS 89 97 97.5 97.6
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4. Data on drinking water obtained from BBS and
MDG website (cont.)

• But if we look at the table 1 where 8
  households were reported that their tube well was
  marked red and 38 mentioned that their tube well
  was not tested for arsenic contamination.
• The same table also showed that in Chittagong
  Division more than 17 households reported that
  their tube well was arsenic contaminated.
• So at the national level after completing the
  test of all households, the rate will be higher
  than 8. The arsenic contamination adjusted rate
  of 80 in 2006 seems logical because the
  contamination is increasing over the year due to
  fall in ground water level.
• Therefore, the difference in MDG website data and
  BBS data is due to adjustment of arsenic
  contamination.

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Improved sanitation

• The definition of improved sanitation as used in
  MICS-2006 is same as the definition used in MDG
  in light of UNICEF, but this definition is not
  strictly followed in other Censuses and Surveys
  of Bangladesh
• Data supplied by BBS for MDG indicator is taken
  from Sample Vital Registration System (SVRS) of
  BBS. This source has been used as annual data is
  available from this survey.
• But this surveys used more lenient definition
  than MICS.
• Thus, the estimates are higher than MICS.
  Table-3 shows improved sanitation coverage from
  MICS-2006.

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Improved sanitation
Table-3 Improved sanitation coverage from
MICS-2006.
Type of toilet facility used by Households Type of toilet facility used by Households Type of toilet facility used by Households Type of toilet facility used by Households Type of toilet facility used by Households Type of toilet facility used by Households Type of toilet facility used by Households Type of toilet facility used by Households Type of toilet facility used by Households
Improved sanitation facility Improved sanitation facility Improved sanitation facility Improved sanitation facility Improved sanitation facility Unimproved sanitation facility Unimproved sanitation facility Unimproved sanitation facility Unimproved sanitation facility
Residence Flush to piped sewer system Flush to septic tank Flush to pit (latrine) Pit latrine with slabs Pit latrine with slabs Pit latrine without slab/ open pit Hanging toilet/ Hanging latrine No toilet facility or bush or field Other Total
National 2.9 13.2 6.0 17.1 39.2 33.9 18.2 7.5 1.2 100.0
Urban 9.4 28.3 6.6. 13.4 57.7 22.4 14.5 2.6 2.8 100.0
Rural 0.2 7.2 5.8 18.7 31.9 38.6 19.7 9.2 0.6 100.0
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Improved sanitation
Table 4 Improved Sanitation coverage by
Residence 1991 to 2006.
Year Sanitation Coverage Sanitation Coverage Sanitation Coverage
Year National Rural Urban
1991 19.8 15.3 56.2
1994 23.0 15.9 63.1
1997 32.4 25.4 72.2
1996 36.4 29.4 76.2
2000 43.4 30.1 76.8
2001 36.9 28.2 67.3
2002 39.9 32.1 71.5
2003 42.5 35.0 72.5
2004 46.2 38.1 78.6
2005 53.3 44.3 79.8
2006 55.0 46.3 80.7
Source SVRS 1991 to 2006.
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Improved sanitation

• The above table indicate that there exist
  variation in sanitation coverage over the year.
• Data used for 2001 is taken from population
  Census 2001 It may be mentioned that the sample
  size of SVRS was increased from 2000 and the
  estimates from the subsequent year is based on
  large sample of 1000 PSU (more than 200,000
  households)
• Therefore, the estimates of later year are
  different from earlier years However, the
  situation improved over the years.
• It may be recalled that in SVRS the sanitary
  latrine has been defined as those latrine where
  the enumerators considered it as sanitary.

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Improved sanitation

• The water sealed and non-water sealed pit latrine
  or even open pit were considered as sanitary
  latrine.
• This made the coverage rate higher than the MICS,
  where MICS followed global definition.
• The sanitation data used in MDG report is almost
  similar to MICS but not the same.
• It is not clear what is the data source of MDG
  indicators.

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Table 5 Improved sanitation coverage by source.
Source National Urban Rural
MDG website 2008 36 48 32
MICS-2006, BBS 39.2 57.7 31.9
Table 5 shows the MDG indicator 7.9 on Sanitation
coverage in Bangladesh obtained from MDG
website. It is observed from the above table
that sanitation coverage in Bangladesh is still
much lower than the excepted outcome.
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Conclusion

• Data discrepancy between BBS data and that of MDG
  website is mainly due to definitional variation.
• As regards improved drinking water, the
  arsenic free drinking water will be less than the
  improved drinking water sources mentioned in our
  data.
• On the other hand, data on improved sanitation
  depends as the definition considered for the
  improved sanitation source.