(MissionNewswire) The international community celebrated World Water Day on March 22, which is recognized annually as a means of focusing attention on the importance of freshwater and advocating for the sustainable management of freshwater resources. World Water Day 2012 was coordinated by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

Each year, World Water Day highlights a specific aspect of freshwater. The theme of this year’s World Water Day was water and food security.

“Agriculture is by far the main user of freshwater,” said United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in an address highlighting World Water Day on March 22, 2012. “Unless we increase our capacity to use water wisely in agriculture, we will fail to end hunger and we will open the door to a range of other ills, including drought, famine and political instability.”

World Water Day is also a day for celebrating organizations and people who work year round to empower women and girls in an effort to make the world a better place. It is work that too often goes uncelebrated.

Salesian Missions has programs helping the poor in more than 130 countries around the globe, including programs that provide safe water and much-needed agricultural training in some of the poorest places on the planet. Here are some examples of that work:

BRAZIL

To address serious water issues resulting from pesticide pollution in a remote area of western Brazil, Salesian Missions worked with members of the Xavante and Bororo Indian communities to obtain clean water from previously inaccessible areas. To do so, they first created wells and designed a mobile drilling truck. To create power, they invented and patented a seesaw pump that would draw water from the depths of the well. Now, solar panels are used. The result is reduced risk of disease, access to potable water, improved infrastructure and expanded farming. The immediate response to a crisis in a community has become a well organized project to ensure the growth of the indigenous groups.

INDIA

Safe drinking water is essential for child survival. In India, progress has been made toward access to safe drinking water with 84.5 percent of rural and 95 percent of urban populations having sustainable access to safe drinking water, according to the World Bank.

At the Don Bosco Centre for Learning in Kura, a new training facility focuses on job training in developing technologies concerning water – ranging from plumbing and sanitation to developing efficient methods for utilization and analyzing existing systems for efficient transportation of water. The courses are designed for youth who have previously left school in order to help them enter the job market.

RWANDA

In Rwanda, food insecurity is a major issue, according to the World Food Program. At least 22 percent of households (2.2 million people) are food-insecure, and another 24 percent are highly vulnerable to food insecurity.

Today, Salesian Missions includes agriculture in its vocational training programs – to ensure that youth of Rwanda learn better agricultural practices as well as keep the school self-sustaining in the face of the country’s food shortages.

PERU

Rebuilding efforts continue after an 8.0 magnitude earthquake in August 2007, which killed more than 500 people in the central coastal cities of Chincha, Pisco and Ica, and injured hundreds more. Years after the quake, Salesians are still helping with ongoing reconstruction efforts in Peru, such as the development of “Mary Help of Christians Village” in Chinca – comprised of 22 small homes with running potable water.

BOLIVIA

In Bolivia, families now have access to safe drinking water in their homes through community water distribution projects. For example, in the town of “19 de Agosto” in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, the new distribution brings water directly to 106 families who previously had to carry potable water from the town well to their own homes. In addition, the distribution system greatly improves the sanitary conditions of the drinking water. And, in the town of “Las Parabas,” 50 families now have water distribution directly into their homes.

In Bolivia, training in agriculture practices inspires transformation of communities. At the Muriyana Agricultural School, more than 600 high school students and 100 advanced students are receiving training while learning to integrate their work into the local community. An estimated 20,000 people in the communities benefit directly from this program as a result of the school’s extension and community outreach programs.

LIBERIA

Liberia is one of the poorest countries in the world, according to the World Bank.  After a devastating civil war, orphans, street children and adolescent ex-combatants are facing – with little education or skills – adult responsibilities.

The goal of the Don Bosco Rehabilitation and Skills Training Program in Liberia is to reach youth through rehabilitative skills training and counseling. By attending classes, youth can make up for the years lost as a result of the war by gaining marketable skills that they can then contribute to the rebuilding of the country. Teenagers to young adults in their mid-twenties are able to receive agricultural training in addition to carpentry, masonry, plumbing, auto mechanics, metal works, and electricity. The program was founded in 1991 through a joint initiative with UNICEF.

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An international day to celebrate freshwater was recommended at the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED). The United Nations General Assembly responded by designating March 22, 1993, as the first “World Water Day.”

Each year, World Water Day highlights a specific aspect of freshwater – this year’s theme is water and food security.

“Agriculture is by far the main user of freshwater,” said United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in an address highlighting World Water Day on March 22, 2012.

“Unless we increase our capacity to use water wisely in agriculture, we will fail to end hunger and we will open the door to a range of other ills, including drought, famine and political instability,” Ban Ki-moon continued.

“In many parts of the world, water scarcity is increasing and rates of growth in agricultural production have been slowing,” he said. “At the same time, climate change is exacerbating risk and unpredictability for farmers, especially for poor farmers in low-income countries who are the most vulnerable and the least able to adapt.”

Two weeks prior to this year’s World Water Day, UNICEF and World Health Organization report showed conclusively that poor people in rural areas are overwhelmingly those without these most basic necessities for life.

As the world commemorated World Water Day, UNICEF called on governments to pay particular attention to those who are being left behind in their countries’ progress, especially with regard to access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation.

“Governments must make sure that their resources achieve real results for the poorest people,” said Sanjay Wijesekera, UNICEF’s chief of water, sanitation and hygiene. “Otherwise they risk leaving large portions of their populations, particularly children, increasingly vulnerable to disease.”

The report, Progress on Drinking Water and Sanitation 2012, says the world met the Millennium Development Goal target for drinking water at the end of 2010, when 89 per cent of the world’s population, or 6.1 billion people, used improved drinking water sources.

However, it says that rural dwellers are several times more likely than their urban counterparts to be without access to safe drinking water. According to the report, globally there is an almost universal disparity of access to safe drinking water in rural areas compared to urban areas.

Of the 783 million people still without improved sources of drinking water in 2010, 653 million are from rural areas. The picture is even worse for sanitation, where globally, 79 per cent of the urban population use an improved sanitation facility compared to 47 per cent of the rural population. Fully 72 per cent of those without access to improved sanitation, or 1.8 billion people, live in rural areas.

UNICEF says the rural-urban divide for safe drinking water is particularly acute in poorer countries. In sub-Saharan Africa the gap between urban and rural is 34 percentage points. On average in Least Developed Countries, ninety-seven out of every 100 rural dwellers do not have piped water on premises.

Overwhelmingly, it is women and girls who are bearing the brunt of the water burden, UNICEF says. Surveys conducted in 25 countries in sub-Saharan Africa found that in 71 per cent of all households without water on the premises women or girls are mainly responsible for water collection. Each household typically requires at least one trip a day, and often more, for water collection. It is estimated that women spend a combined total of at least 16 million hours each day collecting drinking water; men spend 6 million hours; and children, 4 million hours.

“Safe drinking water must reach everyone”, says Wijesekera. “We cannot celebrate progress until those who are hardest to reach can also turn on a tap, or go to a well or pump and get enough safe drinking water for their daily needs.”

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UN Photo/Martine Perret

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