Water and Development

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Water and Development

• A Presentation for Schools
• Contributors
• Jan G. Janssens, Lead Technical Specialist -
  World Bank Institute's Section on Environmental
  and Social Sustainable Development
• Lene Odum Jensen, Consultant - Water and
  Sanitation Unit

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Did you know

• 2/3 of the human body is water
• A human being can survive only one week without
  water
• A human being needs at least 12 gallons of water
  per day for drinking, sanitation, bathing,
  cooking
• More than 1 billion people do not have access to
  safe drinking water (or 1/6th of the worlds
  population).

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Water Use in North America

• In the U.S. and Canada, each person uses 85-90
  gallons of water per day (on average)
• Almost everyone gets their water from the tap (in
  their home)
• People use water for many of their daily
  activities

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Source CIDA, Youth Zone
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Water Use in Developing Countries

• A child born in the developed world uses 30 to 50
  times as much water as one in the developing
  world
• (UNESCO, 2003)

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How much water a person uses per day in
Gallons of water per day
Remember! This is an average, so some use more
water and some use less.
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Piped Water

• In developing countries, many people dont have
  piped water in their houses
• In Africa, only 1 in 4 people have tap water in
  their house
• In Asia, 1 in 2 people have tap water in their
  house
• The poor are most often the ones who dont have
  tap water

People with a household tap
Percent of population
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• Many poor people get their water from

include the longer you have to walk to get
water, the less water you are likely to use.
A community standpipe
Surface water from rivers, lakes, ponds, etc.
A water kiosk
A bicycle water vendor
A village water pump
A tanker truck
A community or village well
Rainwater collection
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Not having easy access to water makes poverty
worse
BECAUSE
Those who buy water from a vendor often pay 10 to
100 times more for water than those who have a
house connection. (UN-Habitat)
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Not having easy access to water makes poverty
worse
BECAUSE
Poor families end up spending many hours each
day to get water
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Time spent getting water

• Women and children often spend several hours each
  day to get water
• Walking long distances to collect water
• Standing in line to get water from a well or
  standpipe
• For example, people in rural South Africa spend
  up to 4.5 hours per day to get water
• Children especially girls miss school because
  they have to collect water
• When families spend less time collecting water,
  they can spend more time on income-generating
  activities
• and children are more likely to go to school.

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Not having easy access to water that is safe to
drink makes poverty worse

• BECAUSE

Drinking contaminated water and/or not having
enough water for personal hygiene can have many
serious health consequences.
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Water and Health

• Water-related diseases are the most common cause
  of illness and death among the poor in developing
  countries.
• Some of the diseases include diarrhea,
  intestinal worms, trachoma, scabies, etc.
• Every day, almost 5000 children die from diarrhea
  mostly because of inadequate water and
  sanitation
• There are more than 4 billion cases of diarrhea
  worldwide each year.

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Water, Health, and Poverty

• Poor children in developing countries are often
  sick with diarrhea and intestinal worms they
  have a hard time keeping up in school, because
  they
• have many sick days where they are absent from
  school
• they feel sick and tired, and find it difficult
  to pay attention
• do not get enough nutrition to develop like other
  children (malnutrition)
• When poor families have to spend money on
  medicine, they have less money for food
• For adults, diarrhea and other water-related
  illnesses can mean that they lose workdays and
  income

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Water for All Challenges

• More than 1 billion people lack access to water.
• The Millennium Development Goals would like to
  halve the number of people without access to safe
  water by 2015.
• That means connecting 1.6 billion people by
  2015OR 292,000 people PER DAY!