Journal 3

I would like to start today’s musings off with some facts that I learned recently. These come from a meeting of high-level members of the Sanitation and Water for All Partnership. A couple of the members of note are the World Bank, the Finance Minister of Nigeria, and a representative from the United States; over 80 countries and organizations attended.

·       According to the World Bank: 1990-2000, 2 billion people gained access to safe drinking water; 1.8 billion to sanitation. However, in the same amount of time the world population increased by 1.5 billion

·       The Millennial Development Goals (MDG) set for water and sanitation will not be met until the year 2026, IF development stays on track. This doesn’t include the added population growth that was mentioned above

·       In Africa alone, due to issues of water sanitation, 700,000 children under the age of 5yrs old die a year, more than 3,000 children die a day

·       There are still around 780 million people without access to safe water

With over 50% of the world’s drinkable water coming from mountains one can see the significance of the efforts of mountain countries. For example, Egypt, or the gift of the Nile, is actually the gift of the Hindu-Kush Himalayas. Because it is that mountain range from which the Nile receives almost 100% of its water.

The significance of this is not lost on me. I can now see more clearly the reason behind the Ambassador asking that I do research on watershed degradation and sustainable development.

One might be concerned about the facts that I mentioned above, and they should be, but the United Nations and the Kyrgyz Republic are working together with many other countries and organizations to find means of bringing sustainable practices to those in need.