Cape Town/Nairobi, 21
March 2011-Rapid urbanization over the last
five decades is changing Africa's landscape
and also generating formidable challenges
for supplies of water and sanitation services,
says a new UN report.
According to the Rapid
Response Assessment by the United Nations
Environment Programme (UNEP) and UN-Habitat,
urban centers in Africa are growing at a
faster rate than anywhere else in the world.
Today 40 percent of
Africa's one billion people live in urban
areas - 60 percent in slums - where water
supplies and sanitation are severely inadequate.
Africa's urban population
without access to safe drinking water jumped
from close to 30 million in 11000 to well
over 55 million in 2008.
Over the same period,
the number of people without reasonable
sanitation services doubled to around 175
million says the report launched on World
Water Day 2011.
"These are the
stark realities and the sobering facts which
need to be addressed as nations prepare
for the landmark UN Conference on Sustainable
Development in 2012," said UN Under-Secretary-General
and UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner.
The conference, also
known as Rio+20, takes a Green Economy in
the context of sustainable development and
poverty eradication as one of its two major
themes.
"There is growing
evidence from work on the Green Economy
that a different path in terms of water
and sanitation can begin to be realized.
Indeed, public policies that re-direct over
a tenth of a per cent of global GDP per
year can assist in not only addressing the
sanitation challenge but conserve freshwater
by reducing water demand by a fifth over
the coming decades compared to projected
trends," added Mr Steiner.
Dr. Joan Clos, Executive
Director of UN-HABITAT, said: "This
report could not come at a more opportune
moment. Africa is the fastest urbanizing
continent on the planet and the demand for
water and sanitation is outstripping supply
in cities. As cities expand, we must improve
our urban planning and management in order
to provide universal access to water and
basic services while ensuring our cities
become more resilient to the increasing
effects of climate change".
The report, which underlines
the growing cooperation between UN-HABITAT
and UNEP on such issues, provides case studies
of cities in several parts of the Continent
where high urbanization rates are not matched
with adequate water and sanitation infrastructure.
These include:
Addis Ababa
For the past 50 years
Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia and
one of the largest cities in Africa, has
grown from 100,000 to 3.5 million people
and is today facing severe challenges to
provide its residents with enough freshwater
and sanitation services. According to the
report, only five percent of the solid waste
collected in Addis Ababa is recycled and
the rest is often piled on open ground,
banks of streams and near bridges where
it is washed into the rivers. Moreover,
fears of food poisoning are worsened by
the fact the 60 percent of the city's food
consumption is supplied by urban farmers
who irrigate their crops using wastewater.
Grahamstown
Grahamstown in South
Africa is another case study highlighted
in the report. Located in a dry part of
the country with frequent droughts, the
city has seen its population more than double
from 76,000 in 2004. Inspiring water initiatives,
such as the Blue Drop System which is a
regulatory tool used by South Africa's Department
of Water Affairs to monitor the quality
of drinking water, and rainwater harvesting
has helped the city to provide adequate
water services to its growing population.
However, the city predicts future crises
as climate change brings more droughts and
water shortages.
Nairobi
Nairobi, Kenya's largest
city, has seen its population increase from
119,000 in 1948 to 3.1 million today, many
in the more than 200 slum settlements spread
across the city and have limited access
to safe water and sanitation. The largest
slum, Kibera, receives about 20,000 m3 of
water per day, 40 percent of which is unaccounted
for as it is lost through leakage or dilapidated
infrastructure.
With half of Kenya's
population expected to be living in urban
settlements by 2015, the country is looking
for solutions and in 2002 introduced the
Water Act to improve the legislative framework
for effective management and control of
water resources.
In line with the Water
Act, Nairobi has also established the Nairobi
City Water and Sewerage Company (NCWSC)
which now works in informal settlements
like Kibera in an attempt to improve access
for the urban poor to water and sanitation.
But while there are
solutions, much more needs to be done, notes
the report, to improve access to safe drinking
water and sanitation for urban areas. Moreover,
it is essential that the long-term solutions
make a connection between urbanization,
water and ecosystems and recognize that
urban areas in Africa will continue to grow
and will the demand for water and sanitation
services.
According to the report,
solutions and policy interventions should
consider some of the following options:
Mainstream the environment
into urban water management;
Acknowledge and support
the role of the private sector in complementing
government and municipal authorities in
delivering water and sanitation services
especially to the poor urban areas;
Take into account the
generally high levels of income poverty
in Africa by acknowledging that market-based
approaches are not always the best option
to supplying water in urban areas in a sustainable
way;
Inform residents about
how the links between forests, protected
areas and water supply;
Demonstrate that it
pays to protect watersheds, instead of building
expensive water purification systems;
Raise awareness on the
impact of poor water quality on health,
economy and the environment;
Mainstream the environment
into urban water management through approaches
such as Payments for Ecosystems Services,
Integrated Water Resources Management, and
Water Demand Management.
About World Water Day:
The UN General Assembly
designated the first World Water Day in
1993, and each subsequent year the March
22 event has highlighted a specific aspect
of freshwater sustainability. Over the years,
World Water Days have focused on transboundary
waters, sanitation, coping with water scarcity,
and water and culture.
For World Water Day
2010, UNEP launched the Clean Water for
a Healthy World report that also feeds into
the discussion by detailing how water quality
is as important as water quantity for satisfying
human and environmental needs, yet has received
far less investment, scientific support,
and public attention. Prepared by the Pacific
Institute, one of the world's leading non-profit
research organizations on freshwater issues,
the report brought global attention to the
need for clean, safe water - and action
and policy to address water pollution.
This year UNEP also
launched the UNEP's Africa Water Atlas which
is a visual account of Africa's endowment
and use of water resources, revealed through
224 maps and 104 satellite images as well
as some 500 graphics and hundreds of compelling
photos. However the Atlas is more than a
collection of static maps and images accompanied
by informative facts and figures: its visual
elements vividly illustrate a succinct narrative
describing and analyzing Africa's water
issues and exemplifying them through the
judicious use of case studies.
See: http://new.unep.org/dewa/Assessments/Ecosystems/Water/CountryWaterProfileinAfrica/tabid/29935/Default.aspx
Other publications that address water quality
include:
Africa's Water Quality:
A Chemical Perspective (Pan Africa Chemistry
Network)
Clearing the waters:
A focus on water quality solutions (UNEP)
Information kit on water
quality and health (WHO)
Saving Lives With Safe
Water: Household water treatment and safe
storage, Advocacy film (UNICEF)
Sick Water - the central
role of Wastewater Management (UNEP/UN-Habitat)
Solid Waste Management
in the World's Cities (UN-Habitat)
+ More
Green Economy Report
on the Agenda in Washington D.C.
It was a full house
on 9 March 2011 for the biggest North American
event to date to focus on UNEP's "Green
Economy" report. More than 250 people
from academia, the private sector, the NGO
community and multilateral organisations,
came together at Johns Hopkins Paul H. Nitze
School of Advanced International Studies
in Washington D.C. for a panel discussion
on the landmark study, led by UNEP Executive
Director Achim Steiner.
Joining Mr. Steiner
on the panel, which was organised in collaboration
with the United Nations Foundation (UNF),
were Kate Gordon, Vice President for Energy
Policy from the Center for American Progress
and Richenda Van Leeuwen, UNF's Senior Director
of Energy Access.
UNEP's report, entitled
Towards a Green Economy: Pathways to Sustainable
Development and Poverty Eradication, calls
for an investment of two per cent of global
GDP in 10 key sectors, including energy,
agriculture and waste management. The Green
Economy report assertively challenges the
myth that investing in the environment comes
at the expense of economic growth. In fact,
the report shows how following a Green Economy
model will trigger green growth and create
more jobs than a 'business as usual' approach,
while using the Earth's resources in a more
sustainable way.
Mr. Steiner took the
opportunity to emphasize the role governments
can play to promote the Green Economy at
next year's United Nations Conference on
Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro,
also known as Rio+20. He explained that
the agenda for the conference had not been
fully developed, thus presenting governments
with a unique opportunity to shape the direction
of both international environmental governance
and sustainable development: the two key
themes of Rio+20.
To see a webcast of the event, visit: www.sais-jhu.edu/pressroom/live.html
