News
Water for development
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| WaterAid's messages will reach many more corners of the world through the United Nations' Human Development Report. |
| Credit: WaterAid / Suzanne Porter |
Every year the United Nations Development Programme produces the Human Development Report which tracks the progress that countries are making in their development.
This year, the report also looks at water and human development - exploring water's relationship to different spheres of human development: human consumption, agriculture, trade, and the environment. WaterAid contributed a background paper on the key problems caused by inequitable access to water supplies and sanitation and contributed to developing a plan of action to achieve universal access to these essential services.
As the Human Development Report holds much influence over international policy-makers, WaterAid's messages will reach many more corners of the world through the report. The HDR will be launched in London and other cities in November.
Painting a future
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| Gyang's paintings are being used to promote good hygiene among rural Nigerian communities. |
| Credit: Gyan Jang |
The water supplies and toilets that WaterAid helps communities to set up can only bring the full health benefits when everyone understands how to use them safely and cleanly.
With this in mind Gyang Jang, a caretaker in our Nigerian office who, having seen the problems faced by communities in his country, taught himself to paint and draw to promote the importance of good sanitation and hygiene. Gyang has now been awarded for this work and his drawings are being used by WaterAid and UNICEF to help people of diverse cultures, speaking different languages, to understand and replicate good sanitation and hygiene practices in their homes and communities.
Sing for water
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| Sing for Water project founder Helen Chadwick with villagers in Ghana. |
| Credit: WaterAid |
In five years, Sing for Water, a mass choir event, has raised over £150,000 for WaterAid projects in India, Ghana and Burkina Faso and over 50,000 Australian dollars for our work in East Timor.
"Last year I went to Ghana to see the work that we are supporting," writes Helen Chadwick, the project's founder (pictured above). "WaterAid's partner there, APDO, is inspirational. With a tiny office, a couple of motorbikes and some funding, they are transforming people's lives in hundreds of villages.
We visited a village where almost everyone had suffered from guinea worm due to unsafe water. There was great hardship and suffering. In another village, where they had had a new pump for 10 months, guinea worm was eradicated and the transformation was incredible: women now had time to work because they were no longer walking miles many times a day to fetch water thus bringing more food and more prosperity to the village."
This year's Sing for Water will take place on Sunday 17 September at the Thames Festival on London's South Bank. To find out more and see how you can get involved throughout the year please call us on 020 7793 2249 or visit our Sing for Water web page.
WaterAid demands Europe spends its aid better
In the last edition of Oasis we asked you to send a postcard calling for improvements in the way that European aid is spent on water and sanitation.
Thousands of you responded and in July we delivered 21,000 postcards to Louis Michel, European Commissioner for Development, and held a press conference in the European Parliament with John Bowis MEP.
But we didn't stop there. Campaigners wrote to their MEPs, 130 UK MPs signed an Early Day Motion calling for a reform of the EU Water Initiative (EUWI) and in August WaterAid staff lobbied at the annual meeting in Stockholm.
All this hard work has paid off as the Commission has now confirmed they will make sure the failing EUWI gets back on track. We will be watching closely to ensure that the €1.4 billion that EU member states spend annually on water and sanitation is spent a lot better to reach the world's poorest people.
Find out more about how to get involved with WaterAid campaigns.
550 latrines in 24 days
The community in Char Dharampur, Bangladesh, had nowhere safe and clean to go to the toilet, but following rallies, cultural shows and demonstrations on hygiene education and latrine building from WaterAid and its partner VERC, the community were so inspired they set to work and built 550 latrines within 24 days!
In less than two months everyone in the village was using hygienic latrines.
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News in brief
The ripple effect
The World Health Organisation estimates that for every $1 invested in water and sanitation you can expect to see a return of between $2 and $52 resulting from better health and improved livelihoods. WaterAid and other organisations in Ethiopia will soon be investigating this further by exploring how investment in water supplies improves people's livelihoods and increases their wealth.
Mogra village wins sanitation prize
Mogra, in the Chhattisgarh state of India, has recently received the prestigious
Nirmal Gram Puraskar award from the President of India after working with
WaterAid to bring good hygiene and sanitation to the community, including facilities in schools and nurseries.
Sanitation is a huge problem in India, where just 15% of the rural population has access to a toilet. But last year WaterAid and its partners helped 93 villages in India become completely free from open defecation and it is hoped many more will follow this year.
Knit a river
WaterAid needs your help to produce an innovative campaigning tool. Instead of a traditional petition, blue knitted squares will be sewn together to create the world's first woollen river. Campaigners will carry the river at future WaterAid campaigning events to make a colourful demand for water and toilets for all.
To take part, simply knit a 15 by 15 cm blue square and send to: Knit a river,
WaterAid, 47-49 Durham Street, London SE11 5JD. Please be as creative as possible - use any yarn, shade, pattern or needle size, the variety of shades and textures will make the river come to life. There is only rule: it must be blue!
Pilika PilikaPilika Pilika is a popular radio soap opera in Tanzania listened to by millions across the country. By working closely with the show, WaterAid has ensured hygiene, water and sanitation messages have been incorporated into the storylines, reaching the wider population in a unique way.
Water for life
With stories from Burkina Faso, Tanzania and India, our Water for life DVD shows how we work with local organisations around the world to find low cost, practical solutions to people's water and sanitation problems.
The 10 minute film is now available free of charge by calling 0845 6000 433.
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