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MaximsNewsWATER
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PETER
NEWBORNE
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PETER
NEWBORNE
is a
trained lawyer and socio-economist, specialising in institutional aspects
of water governance and river basin management, in developing and
‘developed’ countries.
His
current research work focuses on leadership of an Overseas Development
Institute (
ODI)
project on flood risk management - how laws, policies and strategies are
evolving as a response to increasing climate change-related flood risks.
As well as English mother tongue, he speaks fluent French and has full
working Spanish.
Other
recent activities include: analysis of trade-development interfaces and
public-private relationships in the water services sector; review of forms
of, and channels for, claiming rights of access to water; study of civil
society participation in water planning and management; and comparison of
sanitation and hygiene promotion policies in countries in francophone
Africa.
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WHY
THE INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF SANITATION IS NO MATTER FOR PRUDERY by PETER NEWBORNE:
21/11/2007 (MaximsNews Network)
UNITED NATIONS - / MaximsNews Network /
- 21 November 2007 -- On
November 21st, 2007 the UN will launch the International
Year of Sanitation (IYS).
What,
a year talking about ... toilets?!?
In
Europe
, we take for granted a toilet on the premises, at home and work. In the
developing world, however, almost one in two people doesn’t have one. Imagine
having to go to your local park, or the nearest unoccupied land, to
defecate.
Here
it is dog waste we put in plastic bags, but in densely-populated cities in
Africa
, plastic bags serve for human faeces, the famous flying toilets – that’s
‘flying’ as in thrown away, casually disposed of, by the user. No means of
safe disposal are provided.
The ‘IYS’ is designed to put a spotlight on current poor conditions of
hygiene in many places in developing countries - to highlight the little
progress made to-date towards the Sanitation target under the Millennium
Development Goals (MDG 7), and to advocate for the multiple benefits
that stem from better sanitation and hygiene.
For me, personally, visiting the Democratic
Republic of Congo last year was an unforgettable experience. The
rates of access to sanitation in DRC are thought (according to the best
available information) to be 8% and 10% in urban and rural areas respectively,
i.e. only 1 in 10 Congolese has access to a toilet (of the terrestrial,
non-flying kind, that is).
Imagine
what conditions are like in the slums of DRC. As to solid waste disposal, in the
course of the research
we carried out with our partners (Tearfund
and the Programme de Promotion des Soins de Santé Primaires en Zones
de Santé Rurales (PPSSP), we discovered that, in the capital of DRC, Kinshasa,
a city with an estimated population of 6-7 million people (there hasn’t been a
census for many years), the public sanitation authority possesses one sole
functioning rubbish lorry.
Talking about the S-word
So, how is it that access to a basic service, for a basic need, is so lacking?
Part of the story is, of course, stigma: defecation is not the stuff of everyday
conversation. One of the aims of the IYS is to help remove that stigma around
sanitation, so that its importance can be more easily and publicly discussed.
Creative
work of activists in South Asia has shown how communities can
mobilise themselves to stop ‘open defecation’ and that has included (at
least amongst the cultures of that region), overcoming the taboo of talking
about the ‘S-H-one-T’ word (though I hesitate to write it).
Nor has sanitation been, to-date, a common subject for political speeches - few
ministers cut ribbons at latrine blocks, or check the sanitation facilities at
the opening of a new school (they should – absurdly, schools are still being
built without toilet and washing facilities).
Politicians are missing a trick...
As the UN commented
in 2005: "Without strong champions to raise public awareness
and generate concern, the sanitation crisis has not been met with anything
resembling the kind of response necessary to make substantial and sustainable
gains”.
In many countries, overcoming political indifference to sanitation and hygiene
(S&H) is still a challenge. That was illustrated by the studies
ODI carried out with Tearfund in 2006.
Yet,
the degree of risk associated with prioritising S&H is less than many
politicians think. Instead of large capital outlays on infrastructure
(‘hardware’), public investment in S&H can be targeted towards
strengthening human resources (‘software’).
Once
politicians put those apprehensions aside, they will see they are missing a
trick – to strengthen their constituencies. Our
work on sanitation has shown that low levels of expressed interest in
S&H facilities, relative to other needs (including water supply), are often
misleading: where women (particularly) have an opportunity to voice their views,
they frequently value improved sanitation facilities and better hygiene in and
around the household.
Motivations
of privacy and individual dignity are important, often more so than public
health. Political leadership can help convert this desire for better S&H
into perceptible demand.
Labels: United
Nations, U.N.,
Water and
Sanitation
~~~~~
MaximsNews.com, An Independent Voice from the
U.N., provides commentary and analysis from
leading world figures: King Abdullah II
(Jordan), HRH Prince Zeid Ra'ad Zeid Al-Hussein
(Jordan), Sir Brian Urquhart, Hans Blix, Amb.
Richard Holbrooke, Anwar Ibrahim, Bianca Jagger,
Dr. Nafis Sadik, Shashi Tharoor, Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, Noeleen Heyzer,
Masood Haider, Kerry
Kennedy, Ian Williams, Stephen Schlesinger, Sen.
Timothy E. Wirth, Marc Morial, Amb. Jayantha
Dhanapala (Sri Lanka), Amb. Pierre Schori
(Sweden), Amb. William H. Luers, Susan Roosevelt
Weld, Rory Kennedy, Mehri
Madarshahi, J. Michael Adams, Gloria Feldt,
Jeffrey Laurenti, Rodney D. Smith, Ashley
Bommer, Rory
O'Connor, Genevieve Stamper, Max Stamper and
others.
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