Access to clean water should be a basic human right

RECENTLY, there have been forecasts of "water wars," predictions rooted in fears that there is simply not enough fresh water to meet the needs of an expanding and rapidly urbanizing world population.

The concern is understandable. About 2.6 billion people today have no regular access to clean water for drinking, bathing, cooking, or basic sanitation. And the consequences are already appallingly evident: Nearly 2 million children die every year because their families don't have potable water or functioning toilets.

Yet rational analysis shows that there is no objective reason -- financial, logistical, or geographical -- why most of the world's poor cannot be provided with enough clean water to meet their basic human needs. As with staple grains and hydrocarbons, the supply and delivery of crucial goods is the result of many evolving and interacting variables, from market incentives and technological innovation to public investment and government policies. And sometimes the crucial ingredient is political will.

In Cape Town last week, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) launched a pioneering study that debunks many of the myths of the worldwide water crisis -- among them the inevitability of cross-border conflict -- and suggests many practical solutions. UNDP's 2006 Human Development Report, "Beyond scarcity: Power, poverty and the global water crisis," argues that access to a safe and affordable water supply must be considered a basic human right. And governments should recognize this right by ensuring that all citizens get at least 20 liters of water (a little more than 5 gallons ) per day for cooking and drinking and sanitation, and that those who cannot afford to pay get it free.

In most of the developing world, even in arid regions, there is potentially enough water to go around. But the poorer you are, the more it costs. Households hooked up to municipal water pipes get the cheapest water. Families without faucets in the home must go through a web of intermediaries -- tanker truck operators, vendors, and other suppliers -- to purchase basic water supplies, often paying five or 10 times more per gallon. As a result, the poorest families in El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Jamaica devote more than 10 percent of their income to water; in the United States, few spend even 1 percent of their earnings on water bills.

In South Africa, the basic policy framework for a solution is now in place. Access to water was one of the defining racial divides during apartheid. In the post-apartheid era, the government has adopted a rights-based approach to water supply. All municipalities must provide a minimum of 25 liters (about 6 1/2 gallons) free to each household, regardless of economic means, with no household more than reasonable walking distance from a safe water source. The target is full national compliance by 2008, and South African's citizens rightly expect the government to keep its promises.

But this will be costly. The remote provincial towns and burgeoning megacities of the developing world all need major investments in water utilities, and many will require outside financial help. But the ultimate price of a failure to invest in clean water -- in healthcare costs, lost productivity, and, ultimately, human lives -- far outweighs the expense of spending what is necessary now.

The new industrial powerhouses of the 19th century faced the same problem. Infant mortality rates in New York and London were similar then to levels seen in the developing world today -- and for the same basic reasons. Governments invested massively in public water utilities that rapidly reduced gastrointestinal disease and built a foundation for economic growth and a rising quality of life. It can be done.

The UNDP report urges every developing country to prepare a national plan to accelerate progress in water and sanitation, bankrolled by at least 1 percent of gross domestic product. Currently, spending on water supplies in developing nations averages about one-half of 1 percent of GDP.

The report also calls for a Global Action Plan on water and sanitation under the leadership of the United States, Europe, and Japan. The authors say this would require an additional $3.4 to $4 billion in annual aid for water and sanitation -- assistance that should be considered an overdue investment, with huge long-term returns in global economic growth and basic quality of life. On practical as well as moral grounds, it is difficult to imagine a better contribution to the health and well-being of the world's poor.

Kemal Dervi is the administrator of the United Nations Development Programme. Trevor Manuel is minister of finance of the Republic of South Africa.