Why this theme matters

Global advocacy

The Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC) launched the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for All, WASH campaign at the International Conference on Freshwater in Bonn, Germany in December 2001 as a concerted global advocacy effort by members and partners of the Collaborative Council to place sanitation, hygiene and water firmly on the political agenda. IRC, Water Aid and their partners are actively supporting this campaign. The Council and partners hav been advocating for these issues since 1991.

Hundreds of members of the Collaborative Council met in Foz do Igaucu, Brazil in November 2000. Collectively, they considered both Vision 21 and the JMP Global Assessment Report, and reached consensus on the way forward. That way forward is described in the Iguaçu Action Programme (IAP). The IAP indicates how we can put Vision 21 into practice, to progress from the current situation to our desired goal. It is aimed at everybody around the world who is involved in water, sanitation and hygiene, from individual householders to politicians and decision-makers.

Better hygiene, more sanitation facilities and safe water supplies are among the goals of the Iguaçu Action Programme (IAP) agreed upon at the Fifth Global Forum of the Council end November 2000 by some 250 "ambassadors" for VISION 21: Water for People.

Key messages

The WASH campaign has three key messages:

1. The silent emergency
Billions of people are without adequate sanitation, resulting in 6,000 unnecessary deaths every day.

2. Women and children suffer the most
There are still 2.4 billion people around the globe without access to adequate sanitation facilities, with devastating consequences for women and children. Where there are no latrines girls commonly avoid school. Without latrines women and girls wait until dark to defecate, exposing themselves to harassment and sexual assault. Infectious diseases associated with lack of water and sanitation put women's reproductive health at risk. Diarrhoea resulting from poor sanitation and hygiene is responsible for the death of more than two million impoverished children each year.

3. Sanitation is not a dirty word
Many politicians and decision makers do not realise that providing access to sanitation facilities is relatively inexpensive, and will halve the death toll for those who do not currently enjoy this fundamental human right. Politicians need to realise that water, hygiene and sanitation are entry points for poverty reduction. Because the neediest have the least political power, leaders have little incentive to focus on this issue.

Poverty, sickness and death toll: shameful and scandalous

What do these three key arguments add up to? The poverty, sickness and death toll on these populations are shameful and scandalous in these times of relative prosperity. Many of those affected are impoverished women and children living in squalor in Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. Women and girls pay a high price in terms of loss of dignity, lack of education, increases to their already heavy workloads and in infectious diseases. In some countries in Eastern and Central Europe as well as the Middle East many people also suffer in misery from lack of these basic facilities. Improper disposal of human wastes is one of the developing world's most serious public health problems. The statistics are staggering: diarrhoea - dehydration caused by this disease has killed more children in the last ten years than all the people lost to armed conflict since World War II.

Why do politicians and decision-makers turn a blind eye?

Why then do politicians and decision-makers turn a blind eye? Why do the world's citizens not exert greater pressure on their leaders for action to solve this crisis? The reasons are many and complex. Politicians and decision-makers consider sanitation a dirty word. They do not realise that they could halve the death toll on the half of humanity that do not enjoy these fundamental rights. There are few incentives and little prestige or political capital to encourage politicians to tackle sanitation, because those who are most in need have the least political power.

Water has always played a key role in people's cultures and priorities. It is natural that they should demand water rather than sanitation or hygiene promotion as their first priority. However, while investments in water quality and quantity can reduce deaths caused by diarrhoea by 17 per cent, sanitation can reduce it by 36 per cent and hygiene by 33 per cent. One reason why these figures are overlooked is that water sector agencies are typically led by highly qualified water engineers, who are untrained or uninterested in sanitation or hygiene.