Where has all the water gone?  Water Scarcity and Quality Challenges in Developing Countries

Edward D. Breslin, Kate Fogelberg, Wende Valentine

Globally, 1.1 billion people lack access to safe and secure water supplies.  This gap in coverage has led to unprecedented actions by governments, donors and water sector professionals worldwide.  Considerable finance is being allocated to improved water supplies in the developing world.  Governments have pledged to significantly reduce the percentage of people without access to improved water supplies by 2015.  And poor people in the developing world are continuing to call for improved supplies of clean water as one of their top developmental priorities.

Despite these efforts, there is growing evidence that water supply initiatives are failing.  Part of the problem relates to problems with sustaining technologies, but a growing problem relates to declining quantities and qualities of water supplies in poor communities that is alarming in some places.  Communities that had year-round supplies of water now face shortages prior to the arrival of the rains.  Groundwater contamination is growing worldwide, with considerable consequences for the poor.  Conflict over water rights between communities grows as access to diminishing quantities of water pits community against community.

Water For People is a US-based non-governmental organization dedicated to addressing the global water supply and sanitation crisis.  Water For People supports initiatives in 5 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America.  The paper will draw on the experiences of communities supported by Water For People when the water supplies diminish or the quality declines.  The paper will explore some of the solutions we are testing in the field, and offer some insight into how issues of quality and quantities are to be addressed by Water For People and its local partners in the future.