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Saturday, February 20, 2010
Water Fact
Nearly one billion people lack access to safe water and 2.5 billion do not have improved sanitation.
Kenya relocates thousands of animals to game park
SOYSAMBU, Kenya — A senior Kenyan wildlife official says about 7,000 zebras and wildebeests are being moved to one of the country's premier game parks to restore the balance of predators and prey disrupted by last year's drought.
A senior scientist with the Kenya Wildlife Service says the animals are being taken from areas where they are abundant in an effort to replenish Amboseli National Park's population. Charles Musyoki says more than 60 percent of the park's zebra and wildebeest population died during the drought.
KWS staff have moved 137 zebras this week from the privately owned Soysambu Conservancy.
Musyoki says 4,000 zebras will be moved within three weeks. The wildebeests will take longer because many have or are about to give birth to newborns, he says.
A senior scientist with the Kenya Wildlife Service says the animals are being taken from areas where they are abundant in an effort to replenish Amboseli National Park's population. Charles Musyoki says more than 60 percent of the park's zebra and wildebeest population died during the drought.
KWS staff have moved 137 zebras this week from the privately owned Soysambu Conservancy.
Musyoki says 4,000 zebras will be moved within three weeks. The wildebeests will take longer because many have or are about to give birth to newborns, he says.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
'Water justice' advocate: Don't privatize
by Tom Evans, CNNJanuary 8, 2010 -- Updated 0141 GMT
(CNN) -- Every eight seconds, somewhere in the world a child dies from waterborne diseases because the parents cannot afford clean water, according to Maude Barlow, founder of the Blue Planet Project.
"When you add the for-profit motive into water supplies, some people are going to die," Barlow told CNN's Christiane Amanpour Thursday. "Water must be declared to be something that belongs to all of us, which is not that it's a free-for-all, but that it must be equitably divided and shared -- and only government can do that."
Barlow, who is one of the most outspoken advocates of what activists call "water justice," said water is a public trust and must not be privatized.
"The reality is that there is more demand than supply, and the increase in demand and decrease in supply is growing, so it makes a big difference how we're going to decide who's going to allocate water."
A third of the world's population is suffering from water shortages, according to the International Water Management Institute. The United Nations estimates that by 2025, two-thirds of the population will be affected by scarcities.
Those shortages are already the source of local and regional conflict. In Yemen for example, which is at the center of the current al Qaeda terrorist scare, researchers say up to 80 percent of rural disputes are related to water.
The debate over how to alleviate those shortages has intensified in recent years, pitching advocates of privatization programs against those who say water is a public good and that its collection and distribution should remain in the public sector.
A recent United Nations Human Development Report said, "The dialogue has generated more heat than light."
"Some privatization programs have produced positive results" the U.N. said, "but the overall record is not encouraging. From Argentina to Bolivia, and from the Philippines to the United States, the conviction that the private sector offers a 'magic bullet' for unleashing the equity and efficiency needed to accelerate progress towards water for all has proven to be misplaced."
But the U.N. also said many publicly-owned utilities are failing the poor, combining inefficiency and unaccountability in management, with inequity in financing and pricing.
The head of Aquafed, the International Federation of Private Water Operators, told Amanpour that purifying water and transporting it to each individual house has a cost.
Gerard Payen said, "The government has to decide who should bear this cost. Should it be borne by taxpayers or by water users or by both, by a mix?" He said different countries have different answers to that question.
"We only serve 10 percent of the world's population. But we are in those countries with the most needs. In developing countries in the past 10 years, we were able to provide access to water for more than 25 million people," he added.
But leading environmentalist Robert F. Kennedy Jr., founder and president of the Waterkeeper Alliance, told Amanpour the privatization of water supply -- what Kennedy called "the commoditization of water supply" -- is morally wrong.
"It's intrinsically a government function. It has to remain in the hands of the government. The government has a responsibility to all the people, and that this is part of the commons," he added.
"And the law of the commons is that whether you're rich or poor, everybody has the right to the public trust asset," Kennedy said."Nobody has the right to use it in a way that will diminish or injure its use and enjoyment by others."
(CNN) -- Every eight seconds, somewhere in the world a child dies from waterborne diseases because the parents cannot afford clean water, according to Maude Barlow, founder of the Blue Planet Project.
"When you add the for-profit motive into water supplies, some people are going to die," Barlow told CNN's Christiane Amanpour Thursday. "Water must be declared to be something that belongs to all of us, which is not that it's a free-for-all, but that it must be equitably divided and shared -- and only government can do that."
Barlow, who is one of the most outspoken advocates of what activists call "water justice," said water is a public trust and must not be privatized.
"The reality is that there is more demand than supply, and the increase in demand and decrease in supply is growing, so it makes a big difference how we're going to decide who's going to allocate water."
A third of the world's population is suffering from water shortages, according to the International Water Management Institute. The United Nations estimates that by 2025, two-thirds of the population will be affected by scarcities.
Those shortages are already the source of local and regional conflict. In Yemen for example, which is at the center of the current al Qaeda terrorist scare, researchers say up to 80 percent of rural disputes are related to water.
The debate over how to alleviate those shortages has intensified in recent years, pitching advocates of privatization programs against those who say water is a public good and that its collection and distribution should remain in the public sector.
A recent United Nations Human Development Report said, "The dialogue has generated more heat than light."
"Some privatization programs have produced positive results" the U.N. said, "but the overall record is not encouraging. From Argentina to Bolivia, and from the Philippines to the United States, the conviction that the private sector offers a 'magic bullet' for unleashing the equity and efficiency needed to accelerate progress towards water for all has proven to be misplaced."
But the U.N. also said many publicly-owned utilities are failing the poor, combining inefficiency and unaccountability in management, with inequity in financing and pricing.
The head of Aquafed, the International Federation of Private Water Operators, told Amanpour that purifying water and transporting it to each individual house has a cost.
Gerard Payen said, "The government has to decide who should bear this cost. Should it be borne by taxpayers or by water users or by both, by a mix?" He said different countries have different answers to that question.
"We only serve 10 percent of the world's population. But we are in those countries with the most needs. In developing countries in the past 10 years, we were able to provide access to water for more than 25 million people," he added.
But leading environmentalist Robert F. Kennedy Jr., founder and president of the Waterkeeper Alliance, told Amanpour the privatization of water supply -- what Kennedy called "the commoditization of water supply" -- is morally wrong.
"It's intrinsically a government function. It has to remain in the hands of the government. The government has a responsibility to all the people, and that this is part of the commons," he added.
"And the law of the commons is that whether you're rich or poor, everybody has the right to the public trust asset," Kennedy said."Nobody has the right to use it in a way that will diminish or injure its use and enjoyment by others."
Monday, December 14, 2009
Water Fact
Water is essential to the survival of all organisms, it has always been an important and life-sustaining drink to humans. Excluding fat, water composes approximately 70% of the human body by mass. It is a crucial component of metabolic processes and serves as a solvent for many bodily solutes. Health authorities have historically suggested at least eight glasses, eight fluid ounces each (168 ml), of water per day (64 fluid ounces, or 1.89 litres).
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Rain 'not enough' to end hunger in Kenya By Mark Tutton, CNN
Recent rainfall has brought new vegetation to parts of Kenya that haven't seen rain for years, but aid workers say it's too little, too late to undo the damage caused by years of drought.
Kenya is experiencing its worst drought for a decade, according to Peter Smerdon of the UN World Food Program (WFP), with parts of the country having gone for four years without rain.
Smerdon told CNN the drought has brought food shortages to the entire Horn of Africa, with 3.8 million Kenyans and 6.2 million Ethiopians still in need of food assistance.
He said that in some parts of Kenya, one in five children under the age of five is suffering from malnutrition.
Alf Berg is a photographer with aid organization Plan. He was recently in Machakos in south-east Kenya, and Shebedino in southern Ethiopia, where he met some of those affected by years of low rainfall.
"I photographed a family in Machakos where the father was about to die of TB, and he hadn't been eating properly for two or three years," Berg told CNN.
"I talked to another man who had lost 26 of his 32 cattle in the last three weeks -- so it's not just a food security issue, it's a financial security issue too."
October's rains may be enough to officially end the drought, but Berg said they will not be enough to end food shortages in the region.
"Machakos received some rain this year, but before that they had received no rain for four years," he said. "Most of the livestock in the area died over the last two months because there was no foliage in the area."
"The irony is that I tended to photograph lush, green areas, but at the same time I was seeing cows that didn't have the strength to stand up. Two or three weeks into the rain they were still as weak as that."
In fact, Smerdon told CNN that livestock mortality rates actually increased immediately following the rains, as already weakened cows suffered from the cold and contracted illnesses.
Smerdon said that the people worst affected by the droughts were nomadic herders in arid regions in northern Kenya and subsistence farmers on the coast.
"A lot of nomadic herders have lost their livestock and now have less than the minimum number of animals a family needs to survive," he said.
"OK, it rained, but it doesn't change the problems for those people who have lost just about everything," he continued.
Smerdon said these people will need humanitarian assistance for many months, until their herds are replenished or they can borrow money to buy new cattle.
He added that years of drought have meant that many coastal farmers have had to eat the seeds they would otherwise have planted, and have been forced to sell their farming implements and livestock to make ends meet. That means they won't be able to plant crops to take advantage of the recent rain.
"The rains mean they don't have to travel so far to get water, and the price of water has been reduced quite significantly, but it doesn't dig them out of the financial hole they find themselves in -- it just means they're going down slower," Smerdon told CNN.
While the drought hasn't led to famine, long-term food shortages have had a devastating impact on whole communities.
Dr Issa Kipera is Plan's country director for Ethiopia. He told CNN that those who don't get enough food are more susceptible to disease and lack the energy to work, meaning their productivity decreases, creating a poverty cycle.
"Children suffer stunted growth, which affects their development and capacity in later life," said Kipera.
"Many drop out of school because they cannot concentrate on an empty stomach or walk the long distances to get to school, which means they have the consequences of not having an education."
Kipera said the Ethiopian government predicts the food crisis could be over by March 2010, but Smerdon cautioned that rainfall in the region has been declining for the past 20 years and there is a real chance that rains could fail again next year.
"The rains will probably bring down the numbers in need of assistance but not by a great deal," Smerdon told CNN. "The situation is better, but we're not out of the woods yet."
Kenya is experiencing its worst drought for a decade, according to Peter Smerdon of the UN World Food Program (WFP), with parts of the country having gone for four years without rain.
Smerdon told CNN the drought has brought food shortages to the entire Horn of Africa, with 3.8 million Kenyans and 6.2 million Ethiopians still in need of food assistance.
He said that in some parts of Kenya, one in five children under the age of five is suffering from malnutrition.
Alf Berg is a photographer with aid organization Plan. He was recently in Machakos in south-east Kenya, and Shebedino in southern Ethiopia, where he met some of those affected by years of low rainfall.
"I photographed a family in Machakos where the father was about to die of TB, and he hadn't been eating properly for two or three years," Berg told CNN.
"I talked to another man who had lost 26 of his 32 cattle in the last three weeks -- so it's not just a food security issue, it's a financial security issue too."
October's rains may be enough to officially end the drought, but Berg said they will not be enough to end food shortages in the region.
"Machakos received some rain this year, but before that they had received no rain for four years," he said. "Most of the livestock in the area died over the last two months because there was no foliage in the area."
"The irony is that I tended to photograph lush, green areas, but at the same time I was seeing cows that didn't have the strength to stand up. Two or three weeks into the rain they were still as weak as that."
In fact, Smerdon told CNN that livestock mortality rates actually increased immediately following the rains, as already weakened cows suffered from the cold and contracted illnesses.
Smerdon said that the people worst affected by the droughts were nomadic herders in arid regions in northern Kenya and subsistence farmers on the coast.
"A lot of nomadic herders have lost their livestock and now have less than the minimum number of animals a family needs to survive," he said.
"OK, it rained, but it doesn't change the problems for those people who have lost just about everything," he continued.
Smerdon said these people will need humanitarian assistance for many months, until their herds are replenished or they can borrow money to buy new cattle.
He added that years of drought have meant that many coastal farmers have had to eat the seeds they would otherwise have planted, and have been forced to sell their farming implements and livestock to make ends meet. That means they won't be able to plant crops to take advantage of the recent rain.
"The rains mean they don't have to travel so far to get water, and the price of water has been reduced quite significantly, but it doesn't dig them out of the financial hole they find themselves in -- it just means they're going down slower," Smerdon told CNN.
While the drought hasn't led to famine, long-term food shortages have had a devastating impact on whole communities.
Dr Issa Kipera is Plan's country director for Ethiopia. He told CNN that those who don't get enough food are more susceptible to disease and lack the energy to work, meaning their productivity decreases, creating a poverty cycle.
"Children suffer stunted growth, which affects their development and capacity in later life," said Kipera.
"Many drop out of school because they cannot concentrate on an empty stomach or walk the long distances to get to school, which means they have the consequences of not having an education."
Kipera said the Ethiopian government predicts the food crisis could be over by March 2010, but Smerdon cautioned that rainfall in the region has been declining for the past 20 years and there is a real chance that rains could fail again next year.
"The rains will probably bring down the numbers in need of assistance but not by a great deal," Smerdon told CNN. "The situation is better, but we're not out of the woods yet."
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Water Fact
"In the next 24 hours, diarrhea caused by unclean water and poor sanitation will claim the lives of 4,000 children" - OXFAM
2010 Members
Our final members for 2010 have been selected and we're starting to meet at least once a month. Our meetings are meant to help us get to know each other and to help us ready our minds and hearts for the experiences we'll have while 'in country' and upon our return.
Some of our members are people you've met before and others are the 'newbies'. In the coming months we'll take some time to introduce ourselves and help you to understand why each of us feels this is a great project to invest our time, experience and money in.
And the members are:
Paul M.
Sarah M.
Glen M.
Stewart L.
Dave L.
Janet W.
Lynn M.
Darren M.
Colleen M.
Janice E.
Eric M.
Lisa M.
Some of our members are people you've met before and others are the 'newbies'. In the coming months we'll take some time to introduce ourselves and help you to understand why each of us feels this is a great project to invest our time, experience and money in.
And the members are:
Paul M.
Sarah M.
Glen M.
Stewart L.
Dave L.
Janet W.
Lynn M.
Darren M.
Colleen M.
Janice E.
Eric M.
Lisa M.
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