En 2013 y 2014 nuestra organización obtuvo un financiamiento de Fundación Merced y Fundación Bancomer, para un programa de saneamiento ambiental en la comunidad de Palzoquiticpan, municipio de Cosautlán de Carvajal, Veracruz, comunidad con un grado demarginación alto.  El proyecto respondía a un problema en la comunidad en la que no se contaba con almacenamiento de agua, no había drenaje, no había sanitarios adecuados. Fue un proyecto cuyo impacto se reflejo de inmediato, en cada módulo de servicio construído,el beneficio final fue para 33 familias que mejoraron sus condiciones sanitarias y disminuyeron la contaminación del suelo y subsuelo.

Cada módulo contiene un cuarto de ducha, un sanitario seco, un lavadero, un tanque de almacenamiento de agua, con tratamientos de aguas grises, con ello se puede evitar el uso del drenaje y quitar lo shoyos negros que son una constante fuente de contaminación; adicional a esto se instlaron 33 estufas ahorradoras de leña, 33 filtros potabilizadores de agua y se unió con un programa de vivienda digna desde un enfoque de gnénero y derechos humanos. Así las principales beneficiarias  y participantes activas  fueron mujeres, a 4 años de implmentado el proyecto sigue adelante, los sanitarios secos se siguen utilizando, sólo uno lo cambiaron a una conexión con agua que va auna fosa que no es séptica.

Podemos decir que el logro se debe a que hace aproximadamente 18 años se habían construído algunos sanitarios secos en la comunidad, pero como el recurso no alcanzó sólo se hicieron paa 8 familias y dos sanitarios secos en el Jardín de Niños de la comunidad, muchas generaciones han pasado por la escuela y se han acostumbrado al uso del sanitario seco.  Si hay que hacer unseguimiento más o menos periódico, pero es bastante aceptable el nivel de autogestión que se ha logrado. 

Sem água não há vida. A existência de água em quantidades e qualidade adequadas é um dos principais elementos para que o desenvolvimento possa ocorrer. Sabemos da importância de preservar esse precioso recurso, no entanto, não é algo que indivíduos, empresas e governos façam espontaneamente, pois isso requer conhecimento, consciência, cuidados, leis, fiscalização, investimentos e ação conjunta e coordenada. Dessa forma, a água é questão essencial ligada à sustentabilidade e que deve ser elemento central ligado a políticas de desenvolvimento. Ferramentas como a Ciência Cidadã, a Pesquisa Participativa e a Pedagogia de Alternância, visto que têm como elemento comum o empoderamento dos cidadãos através do conhecimento e da participação para construção de um futuro desejável, são importantes meios de buscar a necessária ação conjunta e coordenada entre diferentes públicos para buscar a tão desejada sustentabilidade.

Especialmente essas ferramentas aplicadas com o apoio da Política dos Recursos Hídricos, poderiam ser utilizadas para empoderar cidadãos para participarem de Comitês de Bacia Hidrográfica e formarem grupos para monitoramento e gestão dos recursos hídricos. Esse empoderamento possibilita a busca conjunta, a nível local e regional, de soluções aos mais diversos problemas relacionados a gestão de recursos hídricos e pode incentivar políticas para pagamento por serviços ambientais, por exemplo, para projetos de preservação e revitalização de nascentes.

Sugiro que nesse Forum haja um espaço específico para que cidadãos e organizações apresentem seus projetos e busquem apoio por parte de fontes financiadoras. Eu por exemplo, tenho um projeto de ciência Cidadã para monitoramento de água, e estou buscando apoio.

carolina.semrau@gmail.com - Engenheira ambiental

Well, that’s a quiet big discussion. In Pakistan, the progress towards SGD 6 is quite slow and we are far behind the targets. Pakistan lacks appropriate water & sanitation policies, laws and regulations and wherever it exists, the implementation is a challenge. The access to clean drinking water was not a big challenge before but with continuous extraction of the ground water, polluting the surface water and no proper regulations on industrial waste disposal are the biggest challenges for access to clean drinking water.

The water & sanitation in Pakistan are now provincial subjects and provinces are responsible for water & sanitation services. Out of 4 provinces; 3 have water & sanitation policies while the rest are still struggling to prepare and approve their policies from the provincial cabinet. All the provinces have already a setup of Tehsil Municipal Administrations (TMAs) and Public Health Engineering Department (PHED) which are responsible for water & sanitation services but Punjab & Khyber Pakhtunkhwa have established some other independent companies to improve water & sanitation services in certain districts and cities.

I believe following are the biggest challenges to achieve SGD6.

• Lack of policies, laws & regulation
• Lack of implementation of laws & regulations where exists
• Lack of modern technologies especially in sanitation sector (only 7% of waste water is treated in Pakistan)
• Lack of piloting appropriate models in sanitation sector
• Corruption in water & sanitation sectors
• Lack of awareness among people regarding water & sanitation
• Lack of technical capacities of government service providers
• Lack of investment in the sector
• Lack of appropriate budget allocation in the sector
• Lack of allocated budget spending in the sector
• Lack of political will
• Traditional decades old practices of the service providers

I believe that following measures should be taken;

• CSOs should influence the local leadership and service providers to implement the policies in real sense and educate the local people on the policies that exists
• CSOs should pilot the low cost and appropriate models in communities in partnership with relevant service providers.
• A lot of advocacy and lobbying efforts are needed to adopt appropriate measure for solid waste management as well as for waste water management
• CSOs should use RTI for improving the Water & Sanitation Services
• CSOs should make partnerships with government services providers for improving their capacities in service provision.
• The budget allocation and its spending is a big challenge. Everyone has to play its role.
• The local leadership should be mobilized to incorporate the water & sanitation in their party agenda for upcoming elections.

The high quality of most groundwaters, resulting from the self-purification capacity of soils and underlying rocks, has long been a key factor in human health and wellbeing. More than 50% of the world’s population now rely on groundwater for their supply of drinking water. Aquifers used for drinking water supplies should be assessed and monitored for pollution risks. In most cases a properly located and soundly-engineered water-well that prevents direct entry of pollutants, such as pathogenic organisms, fuels or other contaminants, represents a low-cost, reliable and safe source. Collaborative actions by a range of water-users will help protect this vital resource. For further information see IAH’s strategic overview on human health and groundwater.

Dear all, 

I invite you to know the different kind of social water management models that developed the Thirst Zero Program (Programa SEDCERO - www.sedcero.org) in the Gran Chaco Americano region (Argentina, Bolivia, Paraguay).

In Argentina, we are working in a national research about community water management, water legal issues, technologies (options for arsenic & other local problems), and some 'water management tools'. All this research is part of a collaborative process with practitioners and policy makers. The research will be available in a virtual plataform in october 2017.

We hope this kind of action contribute to the right of access to water and sanitation.

Water is becoming a scarce commodity in the country. The per capita water availability is decreased from 5,650 cubic meters to 990 cubic meters from 1947 to 2013. There is no planning at national or provincial level for water safety and water resources conservation. The ground water is brutally exploited by people, agriculture and industrial sector. There are more than 1.1 million tube wells used for agriculture purposes where 37 MAF water is extracted from ground against 35 MAF recharge capacity.

IRSP is working in the water and sanitation sector since last 16 years and has developed good linkages with government agencies and CSOs. Following are the suggested efforts are IRSP is doing to help people realizing the issues and influence the decision makers for appropriate decision/policy making;

- awareness raising with local communities to make efficient use of water in daily life

- developing IEC material to mobilize people

-organizing civil society for joint efforts

-advocacy with elected representatives for improved water policies

-Advocacy with service providers to mobilize their consumers

-Building the capacity of service providers for appropriate services delivery

-piloting models for sustainable water sources

Hello, this is Naomi from Japan. Water issues in this archipelago is not that much recognized as regional issues as we do not share directly the source with other nations. Though I guess that is one reason why there still remains rather too relaxed approach about the matter especially for urban planning. As this is a country of Confucian tradition, the decision makers in governments are often over 60 years old and it is not rare to find them without sufficient knowledge of sustainability and water ... And it seems to me it did not occur at all during their planning process to consider a possibility that concreting greenery and sand beaches can change dramatically the underground water system even in a tiny space of a city. Then, those civil engineers found flooding in downtown almost weekly during summer after torrential rain. In the end, these days, I concluded it is the matter of education not only for young people, but also for grandparents who graduated their colleges 50 years ago, and happen to sit for the top tables of offices.

A correlação feita entre água, saneamento e saúde é perfeita, uma vez que são questões tão imbricadas que não dá para pensar de forma estanque sobre cada uma.

Além da importância da educação ambiental para o despertar ecológioco, entendo que a positivação dos direitos à água potável e ao saneamento básico no corpo das Constituições - no caso do Brasil, a Constituição Federal de 1988 e as Constituições estaduais - contribuiriam para a promoção de políticas voltadas, de fato, para o acesso a esses direitos.

O art. 225 da Carta Magna brasileira de 1988 não é suficiente para o propósito aqui desejado, que é, de forma efetiva, elevar a água potável e o saneamento básico ao patamar de direitos formal e materialmente constitucionais.

Tal linha de pensamento temos defendido há algum tempo, conforme se verifica no livro "A água e seus instrumentos de efetividade: educação ambiental, normatização, tecnologia e tributação", ed. Millennium, 2013.

Dear Water Colleagues, great to be on this platform. My name is Boniface Aleobua, working for the African Development Bank, and currently based in Mozambique in Southern Africa.

In contributing to the current topic of Sustainability- water, sanitation and health the subject gets a bit clouded when analyzed in situations, where the governments, and people are not adequately blessed with adequate education and human capacity. This applies particularly, for countries still on the lower rungs of the developmental ladder, where adequate technical capacity to implement, and maintain water projects, is still patchy. What do we do and how do we do it, to ensure that all of the infrastructure which we support are maintained and allowed to function efficiently?

Over the past 20 years, technology has advanced at an encouraging pace, with the deployment of varying systems and tools, in the field of producing, and testing, treating our raw water, which for the scenario I have made reference to, this does not necessarily count as a benefit, due to complexities and patchy human capital development in some countries in Africa. The result is an inappropriate operation and upkeep of the numerous facilities implanted in many of these countries.

Let us keep it simple, and I say maybe we need not lose focus on the concept of Appropriate Technology, thereby ensuring that the technologies deployed in many such environments are not alien to the skills available locally or regionally to manage the systems Sustainably.

In order words, we need to continue to promote and push the newer technologies as well as the basic non complicated technologies alongside one another, in order to bring these within operation ability of respective beneficiaries. This way, we can continue to ensure that the systems that are put in place are sustainably managed for many more years to come.

A contribuição para implementação de políticas ou projetos de gestão integrada de recursos hídricos (GIRH) considerando aspectos de água, saneamento e saúde das pessoas pressupõe oportunidades de participação nos Colegiados Hídricos detentores de recursos e que implantaram os seus instrumentos. Com a bagagem amealhada ao longo de multifárias capacitações e participações diretas, trazendo todo o cabedal de conhecimentos e vivências. Assim tem sido feitro no âmbito dos Comitês da Bahia e do Rio São Francisco, colaborando e participando na confecção de projetos hidroambientais e de saneamento, eleitos como prioritários, além da devida fiscalização.

A promoção da cooperação transfronteiriça sobre água, saneamento e saúde das pessoas depende muito do apoio a ser dado pelas instâncias governamentais relacionadas que possuem nas pessoas que atuam pela sociedade civil de mão de obra especializada e gratuita, no âmbito da govervança séria e responsável, pronta para socorrer o fracasso da governabilidade

A garantia da governança multi-nível deve sim, envolver as partes interessadas e avaliar os resultados das políticas de água relacionadas a água, saneamento e saúde das pessoas por meio dos requisitos básicos de participação ampla e democrática, descentralização por parte das instâncias governamentais relacionadas e a integração de todos os stakeholders e atores relacionados.

Hello Diana, I'm very happy to greet you again. Thank you for your comments on our modest work. Casually, I remembered our last meeting at the International Water Week in Korea, KIWW 2016. Last week we registered our participation in KIWW 2017 with a project called "Ekoducha H2O+ Reuse of gray water and circular economy, which will complement the Rainwater collecting systems in dry seasons.

The ekomuro project for water collection is the result of a constant concern on environmental issues that, in the company of my work group, we wanted to complement with our professional activities in architecture and sustainable housing. The project is as complement to the work I'm developting on solar energy to heat water, based on appropriate technology and circular economy. It is about taking advantage of the natural resources on winter and summer. What we want to do is to teach people that they do have total access to these technologies in an eco-efficient, practical, sustainable and environmentally friendly way. Ekomuros were designed with a social-environmental approach, tending to give a solution of the need to recover rainwater, using a verical tank that occupies minimal space in urban housing. And also responds to the urgent need of reusing plastic wastes that are polluting our oceans.

The project has had a process of acceptance by the community, highlighting the importance in pedagogical processes related to environmental education in schools, socio-environmental responsibility in companies and organizations that have supported the projectand especially in peri-urban communities they are the ones who really feel the need to solve the water and observed in the project a successful solution.

It is these communities that give us an example of sustainability, when from their homes there is a true culture of water saving and it was they who drove our new initiative to recover gray water. In the majority of families the members are forced to recover the water from the personal toilet in the shower, they use a plastic container wide enough, 60 cm and deep of approximately 20 cm of height and they shower inside to recover the water Gray for washing the toilets. The Ekoducha project aims to improve this condition, recovering gray water in a practical and eco-efficient way. Conscious that the states and governmental entities have to guarantee safe water to the population. We wish that each individual, when making his own ekoducha with recovered materials, feels committed to providing sustainable solutions to the present and future problems of water.

The Ekoducha project will be a complement to the systems of recovery of rainwater in dry periods, it aims to begin to raise awareness in the population about the importance of recovering gray water, as a global trend to solve the problems of water supply. Water in the context of the principles of circular economy, applied to the recovery and reuse of waste water and the appropriate disposal of plastic waste and that the global water and plastic councils respectively have as purpose to achieve the development objectives Sustainable 2030.

The ekoduchas are made with recovered pet bottles of three liters. Four lines of Bottles connected to two 4 "and 1" end supports in pvc, allow to recover 40 Liters of gray water. It is made up of a support structure in pvc pipe and overlay in recovered Polypropylene equivalent to recovering 1500 covers of this material, a waterproof tarpaulin attached to an aluminum frame, a drainage grille, plastic micro and macromembrane filters in one of the lines Of bottles and a mechanical pump in pvc or electric minibomba of extraction of gray water complete the system. Is an exemplar of the circular economy that includes new principles of mandatory inclusion of water saving devices in urban housing and residential and commercial buildings, its implementation will significantly contribute to more families to access safe water in periurban communities in condition of vulnerability.

http://ekomuroh2o.wixsite.com/ecoh2o/ekoshower-h2o

In relation to our participation in the 8th forum in Brazil, of course we would like to participate and have the opportunity to share our experience as winners of WWCH program in Korea and also share our new projects to recover and reuse wastewater. To tell them that in recent days and in recognition of my country as winners of the National Ecology Blue Planet 2017, the ambassador of the Republic of India, told us about his interest in the Ekomuro project, would be the most important achievement of the project if we succeed in replicating it in this country. 

Best Regards

Olá!

Moro em uma cidade cercada de lagoas maravilhosas que fazem parte de uma Bacia Hidrográfica muito importante para o Estado onde vivo, além de abranger diversos ecossistemas. Acredito que praticamente todos os moradores dos municípios em que se encontra esta Bacia Hidrográfica possuem sumidouros em casa, os quais os efluentes lançados neste local correm o risco de percolar e contaminar o lençol freático e consequentemente os recursos hídricos mais próximos. Além deste fator, conheço diversas pessoas que canalizaram seus efluentes diretamente nas redes pluviais ou diretamente nos recursos hídricos. Em consequência à estes exemplos de descaso, doenças causadas pelo uso de poços artesianos, muitas vezes irregulares, ou ainda a destruição de ecossistemas importantíssimos. Acredito que esses pontos devem ser debatidos, pois no mundo existem cerca de 7,2 bilhões de habitantes e em muitos lugares não existe saneamento adequado ou como no caso dos municípios próximos à mim, saneamento básico sem preocupação com o ambiente. 

Agradeço pela oportunidade.

Nathalia Link Pereira