Bid for global decent sanitation will fail at current progress rate Water Aid warns

Data from a monitoring programme by UNICEF and the World Health Organisation show that universal access to even basic water, sanitation and hygiene services “will not be achieved by 2030 at current rates of progress,” according to Water Aid.

According to Water Aid, without a “dramatic progress shift,” the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 target of universal access to “safely managed sanitation” – a toilet that is linked to safe waste disposal – by 2030 will not be achieved for “decades”. That, said Water Aid, will “undermine the progress of virtually every other SDG.”

The latest figures from the Joint Monitoring Programme for Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene (JMP) show 2 billion people still do not have access to even basic sanitation This was despite 2.1 billion people having, between 2000 and 2017, gained access to a decent toilet – one that is private, and built in a way that will keep contents separate from water sources, and within a household.

Chief executive of WaterAid UK, Tim Wainwright, said: “We must turn our attention to closing the huge gaps that exist between the experiences of the poorest and richest people within countries. It is the poorest and most marginalised people who have the most to gain from accessing good water, sanitation and hygiene services and breaking free of poverty.