Thinking Outside the Stall on World Toilet Day
Thinking Outside the Stall on World Toilet Day
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 15 2012 (IPS) - When the United Nations commemorates World Toilet Day next week, there will be a lingering question in the minds of activists: how best can water and sanitation be given high priority in the proposed Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the U.N.’s post-2015 economic agenda?
Water and sanitation are basic human rights that underpin health, education and livelihoods. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS.
Dr. Jennifer Platt, sustainability director at WASH Advocates in Washington, told IPS that World Toilet Day on Nov. 19 is a great opportunity to start thinking outside the stall – about water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH).
As cornerstones of public health, WASH should be the first step of any development initiative.
“Sustainable water, sanitation, and hygiene for all should absolutely be one of the key goals in the post-2015 SDGs,” she added.
The highly-touted Millennium Development Goals (MDGS) include a reduction by 50 percent of the proportion of people living in extreme poverty and hunger; reversal of the spread of HIV/AIDS, elimination of gender inequality; achievement of universal primary education; reduction of child mortality; improvement of maternal health; sustainability of the environment; and a global partnership for development.
The target date to achieve these goals is 2015.
But water and sanitation wasn’t one of the eight primary goals and remained only as a subtext under “environmental sustainability”: a call for a reduction by 50 percent of those who do not have access to drinking water and adequate sanitation.
http://www.ipsnews.net/2012/11/thinking-outside-the-stall-on-world-toilet-day/
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Go to some third world countries, and you'll see rivers that are completely nasty, because there are no toilets or sewers, and people just shit in the river. Then people downriver scoop up water to cook and bathe with... 