“Water is Life” – This statement is eminent to everyone, but few understand that it is not true unless rephrased to “Safe Water is Life”. Diarrheal diseases including cholera caused by contaminated unsafe drinking water, inadequate sanitation and hygiene have been claiming the lives of 1.8 million people annually globally. According to World Health Organization (WHO), 90% of them are under 5 year old children of the developing world. This implies that we are losing 4,500 children each day. Therefore the word “Safe” is very imperative and consequently we need to advocate “Safe Water is Life”. What is Safe Drinking Water then? According to the WHO, safe drinking water is water with biological, chemical and physical characteristics that meet WHO guidelines or national standards. What does Drinking Water Quality mean? Abel Wolman, renowned water engineer, describes water as H2O + X where “X” represents constituents of water which may be useful or harmful for human beings. This “X” simply signifies drinking water quality and it can be broadly divided into three categories – physical, chemical and biological parameters.
In the context of Nepal, about 80% of the populations have access to drinking water (Department of Water Supply and Sewerage). However, it is very difficult to ensure that everyone is consuming safe drinking water all the time. Many studies and researches conducted on Urban Water Supply and Treatment Systems have revealed that supplied water often get polluted during transmission which is unsafe to drink during point of use. Whereas, most of the rural water supply schemes use unprotected water sources likely to be contaminated anytime. Ironically, most of these schemes don’t have provision of water treatment facilities. As a result, the frequent outbreaks of water borne diseases are very common in Nepal and have been claiming hundreds of innocent lives every year.
Simple interventions such as protecting water sources, identifying and improving hazardous locations and promoting Point of Use Drinking Water Treatment options can significantly improve quality of drinking water. This would definitely reduce the incidence of preventable water borne diseases, saving hundreds of lives in Nepal. Many agencies including Government and Non Governmental agencies are actively involved in promoting safe drinking water and sanitation through research, education and effective service delivery.
In the face of all these endeavors, still more than 10,500 children are dying each year due to water borne diseases in Nepal (WaterAid, 2008). So what went wrong? Where did we miss?
Following are some of the key lessons learnt and facts from few decades that we have to consider for
improving drinking water quality in Nepal:
On 26 June 2006, the Government of Nepal (GON) published and gazettes the National Drinking Water Quality Standards (NDWQS), 2062 B.S. This is probably the greatest milestone made on Drinking Water Quality sector in Nepal. While issuing the standards, the government has also stated that the standards are to be implemented in two phases: first phase, within a period of five years in the urban and small town water supply systems and second phase, within five to ten years from the date of implementation in all rural community water supply schemes. Although the GON has taken positive step by issuing the NDWQS and the schedule for its implementation, the actual enforcement of the standards has been a big challenge. Very little information is available on the quality of water on the supplied water in the urban areas and also about the possible ways to achieve the standards. Similarly, awareness on drinking water quality and the NDWQS is also lacking even in policy and decision making level. Therefore, immediate interventions are required to ensure that the NDWQS is implemented. Recently, World Health Organization (WHO) has been promoting water safety plan (WSP) as a tool for ensuring safety of drinking water supply through the use of a comprehensive risk assessment and risk management approach. WSP could possibly be used for NDWQS implementation as well.
Many key organizations government have been actively promoting Point of Use (POU) drinking water treatment options. These POU options include simple yet effective technologies such as boiling, filtration, chlorination and SODIS. UN agencies, academic institutions, private and corporate sectors have joined hands together to intensify promotion of POU options in the vulnerable communities in Nepal. However, availability of POU drinking water treatment options in all parts of the country, particularly in remote areas, remains a big challenge. Therefore, active local entrepreneurship should be developed to promote POU technologies appropriate for specific climatic and geographic conditions.
Arsenic Blanket Testing and Mitigation programme in Nepal has been implemented with the involvement of key stakeholders under the coordination of the then National Arsenic Steering Committee (NASC) which has recently been reformed into National Drinking Water Quality Steering Committee (NDWQSC). The NDWQSC can be established as good sharing and communication platform for implementers and policy makers to formulate new policies and plans, implement activities and communicate lessons learnt and achievements on drinking water quality sector in a coordinated manner.
Regular water quality testing and monitoring mechanism is not available. Proper documentation and data management system should be maintained to ensure that we have sufficient information for effective planning, awareness raising, research and advocacy.
Last but not the least, the messages on safe drinking water quality, sustainable sanitation and proper hygiene practices should be provided together during the implementation of any WASH programmes. Often these messages are not relied to end users effectively and collectively.
In a short synopsis, the improvement in the drinking water quality is still a challenge in Nepal. But there are solutions. It comes in the form of ideas, technology, service delivery model, water safety plan, building
entrepreneurs, raising awareness, energizing and building entrepreneurships, sensitizing local public and so
forth. The crux of these various method and mechanism stands on establishing simple yet effective communication mechanism to combat problems associated with poor water quality, inadequate sanitation
and hygiene practices. The key messages, lessons learnt, experiences, insights and innovative ideas on water quality should be shared and discussed to create simplicity out of complexity.
“Communicating Water Quality: Challenges and opportunities” is the main slogan of World Water Day 2010.
Let us take this opportunity to communicate our messages and ideas effectively through various avenues, forums, web based social media. Let us communicate and act in a simple way to accomplish the essence of
“CLEAN WATER FOR HEALTHY WORLD”.
Author: Bipin Dangol, Program Manager, Water Quality Programme, Environment and Public Health
Organization (ENPHO). E-mail: bipindan@yahoo.com
(Source: Pani ra sarsaphai- a e-bulletine, RCNN)
