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Joaquim Cardoso MSc
Founder and Chief Researcher, Editor and Advisor
December 14, 2022
Source: World Health Organization
14 December 2022
Urgent action is needed globally and locally to achieve safe and sustainably managed water, sanitation and hygiene for all in order to prevent devastating impacts on the health of millions of people.
Findings from WHO and UN-Water’s Global Analysis and Assessment of Sanitation and Drinking-Water (GLAAS) report show that acceleration is needed in many countries to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 — water and sanitation for all by 2030.
- While 45% of countries are on track to achieve their nationally-defined drinking-water coverage targets,
- only 25% of countries are on track to achieve their national sanitation targets.
- Less than a third of countries reported to have sufficient human resources required to carry out key drinking-water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) functions.
The GLAAS 2022 report, which details the latest status of WASH systems in more than 120 countries, is the largest data collection from the greatest number of countries to date.
While there has been an increase in WASH budgets in some countries, a large number — over 75% of countries reported insufficient funding to implement their WASH plans and strategies.
“We are facing an urgent crisis: poor access to safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene claim millions of lives each year, …
… while the increasing frequency and intensity of climate-related extreme weather events continue to hamper the delivery of safe WASH services,” said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General.
“We are facing an urgent crisis: poor access to safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene claim millions of lives each year, …
… while the increasing frequency and intensity of climate-related extreme weather events continue to hamper the delivery of safe WASH services,”
“We call on governments and development partners to strengthen WASH systems and dramatically increase investment to extend access to safely managed drinking water and sanitation services to all by 2030, beginning with the most vulnerable.”
“We call on governments and development partners to strengthen WASH systems and dramatically increase investment to extend access to safely managed drinking water and sanitation services to all by 2030, beginning with the most vulnerable.”
The GLAAS data show, however, that most WASH policies and plans do not address risks of climate change to WASH services, nor the climate resilience of WASH technologies and management systems.
Just over two thirds of countries have measures in WASH policies to reach populations disproportionately affected by climate change. However, only about one third monitor progress or allocate explicit funding to these populations.
“The world is seriously off-track to achieve SDG 6 on water and sanitation for all, by 2030.
This leaves billions of people dangerously exposed to infectious diseases, especially in the aftermath of disasters, including climate related events,” said Gilbert F. Houngbo, Chair of UN-Water and Director General of the International Labour Organization.
“The new data from GLAAS will inform the voluntary commitments the international community will make at the UN 2023 Water Conference in March, helping us target the most vulnerable communities and solve the global water and sanitation crisis.”
Urgency and opportunities
Dire consequences of climate change and extreme weather events bring more attention to the issues, underlining an urgent need for a whole-of-society approach and global cooperation to act together.
The GLAAS 2022 report shows that countries making progress demonstrated high level of political commitment and investments in improving safe WASH systems.
With the GLAAS 2022 report, WHO and UN-Water call on all governments and stakeholders to scale up support for WASH service delivery, through strengthened governance, financing, monitoring, regulation, and capacity development.
With the GLAAS 2022 report, WHO and UN-Water call on all governments and stakeholders to scale up support for WASH service delivery, through strengthened governance, financing, monitoring, regulation, and capacity development.
The report sets the scene for action ahead of a historic water and sanitation meeting planned in 2023.
For the first time in 50 years, the global community-through the United Nations-will review progress and make firm commitments to renew action on water and sanitation with global leaders.
The UN 2023 Water Conference — formally known as the 2023 Conference for the Midterm Comprehensive Review of Implementation of the UN Decade for Action on Water and Sanitation (2018–2028) — will take place at UN Headquarters in New York, 22–24 March 2023.
About UN-Water
UN-Water coordinates the United Nations’ work on water and sanitation. UN-Water is a ‘coordination mechanism’. It is comprised of United Nations entities (Members) and international organizations (Partners) working on water and sanitation issues. UN-Water’s role is to ensure that Members and Partners’ deliver as one’ in response to water-related challenges.
Originally published at https://www.who.int on December 14, 2022.
REFERENCE REPORT
Strong systems and sound investments: Evidence on and key insights into accelerating progress on sanitation, drinking-water and hygiene
Overview
- The UN-Water Global Analysis and Assessment of Sanitation and Drinking-Water (GLAAS) 2022 report compiles new data on drinking-water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) from 121 countries and territories and 23 external support agencies (ESAs).
- It serves as a global reference to inform commitments, priority-setting and actions during the second half of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and for the 2023 Conference for the Midterm Comprehensive Review of Implementation of the United Nations Decade for Action on Water and Sanitation (2018–2028) (UN 2023 Water Conference).
- The report also highlights opportunities to accelerate progress in key WASH areas that positively affect the quality and sustainability of WASH services and delivery, pandemic preparedness and resilience to climate change.
Suggested citation.
Strong systems and sound investments: evidence on and key insights into accelerating progress on sanitation, drinking-water and hygiene. The UN-Water global analysis and assessment of sanitation and drinking-water (GLAAS) 2022 report. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2022. Licence: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.
Acknowledgements
UN-Water and the World Health Organization (WHO) gratefully acknowledge the financial support provided by the Agence Française de Développement (AFD), France; the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF); the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Directorate-General for International Cooperation (DGIS), Netherlands; the Sanitation and Hygiene Fund (SHF); the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), Switzerland; and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), to the UN-Water Global Analysis and Assessment of Sanitation and Drinking-Water (GLAAS) initiative and towards the development of WASH accounts. UN-Water and WHO also extend their gratitude to UNICEF for supporting a number of countries financially and technically in the GLAAS process. The preparation of this report involved contributions from thousands of individuals representing all regions of the world. UN-Water and WHO would like to extend their gratitude to all those organizations and individuals that contributed to the development of the results and report — especially those who coordinated efforts and submitted information from 121 countries and territories and 23 external support agencies.
G L A A S 2 0 2 2 R E P O R T SUMMARY INDICATORS
Infographic
Fig. 4.2 Status of progress needed to reach national sanitation coverage targets
Contributors
The GLAAS team at WHO headquarters:
Betsy Engebretson, Joanna Esteves Mills, Mark Hoeke, Cathy Jung, Chris Larrea, Sofia Murad, Marina Takane and Kathleen Tiffay; with significant inputs from Didier Allély, Claire Preaud and Tom Stakes.
The GLAAS team was led by Fiona Gore under the guidance and support of Bruce Gordon, Unit Head, Water, Sanitation, Hygiene and Health.
His support, along with that of Maria Neira, Director, Department of Environment, Climate Change and Health, was instrumental to the successful completion of the report.
Names mentioned
Gilbert F. Houngbo, Chair of UN-Water and Director General of the International Labour Organization.
