Sick water?

PART I THE CHALLENGES OF WASTE- WATER ANDWASTEWATER MANAGEMENT

Wastewater – spent or used water from farms, communities, villages, homes, urban ar- eas or industry may contain harmful dissolved or suspended matter. Unregulated dis- charge of wastewater undermines biological diversity, natural resilience and the capacity of the planet to provide fundamental ecosystem services, impacting both rural and urban populations and affecting sectors from health to industry, agriculture, fisheries and tour- ism. In all cases, it is the poorest that are the most severely affected.

In this part of the report we will present some of the key chal- lenges that the unregulated discharge of wastewater presents.

These impacts continue to grow. Global populations are increas- ing rapidly and will reach between nine and 11 billion in 2050, and as population increases so does the production of waste­ water and the number of people vulnerable to the impacts of se- vere wastewater pollution. Almost 900 million people currently lack access to safe drinking water, and an estimated 2.6 billion people lack access to basic sanitation (WHO/UNICEF, 2010). Lack of capacity to manage wastewater not only compromises the natural capacity of marine and aquatic ecosystems to as- similate pollutants, but also causes the loss of a whole array of benefits provided by our waterways and coasts that we too often take for granted; safe water for drinking, washing and hygiene, water for irrigating our crops and producing our food and for sustaining ecosystems and the services they provide. The fi- nancial, environmental and societal costs in terms of human health, mortality and morbidity and decreased environmental health are projected to increase dramatically unless wastewater management is given very high priority and dealt with urgently.

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