Taps running dry, women ferry water from long distances in Shopian villages.
SHOPIAN: About 700 households of Chotipora and adjoining villages in Shopain district are facing acute drinking water shortage from past one month.
The affected villages include Cheki-saidpora, Malik-Saidpora, Banni-Mohalla and Chowhan Mohalla.
Residents, however, alleged that the water scarcity was not a month old problem, but has been an issue over the years.
Ghulam Muhammad, a former deputy Sarpanch of Chottipora village said that they took up the issue with the deputy commissioner and Tehsildar but to no avail.
He said that there were two water supply schemes for the area but both failed due to “callous attitude of authorities”.
“The one water pipeline which gives water to our village gets water from dirty canals which carries pie of cattle and buffaloes,” he said.
Shani Jan, 30, of Chottipora village, who was carrying a water bucket on her head to ferry water from some two kilometers away said, “From past one month there was no tap water supply in the village, if restored the water is muddy, even not in a condition to be used for washing purposes.” Executive Engineer, Public Health Engineering Shopian, Ghulam Ahmed Beig rejected the allegations and said that the villages were getting timely water supply.
“These people are lying, we provide them better water supply, come with me tomorrow and I will show you the drinking water supply in the area,” he said.
He rejected the reports despite being told of the village women ferrying water from long distances, and the taps running dry.

World Water Week Opens In Stockholm With 3,000 Participants.
World leaders, water experts, development professionals, policy-makers, and one astronaut, began a week-long meeting in Stockholm focused on finding ways to better use and reuse the world’s increasingly scarce fresh water.
A statement by Ms Rowena Barber, Communication Manager, Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI), made available said water is fundamental to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.
‘‘The realisation is there, we need to become more efficient water users; we need to make some drastic changes.
“World Water Week is a key meeting place for the water and development community; it is here that we come together and make sure that the very best ideas are brought forward.’’ According to her, Holmgren said the World Water Week, organised by SIWI, is the world’s biggest global annual meeting focusing on water and development.
They strive together to find new ways to meeting the world’s growing water challenges.
Christer Fuglesang, astronaut and member of Sweden’s Royal Academy of Science, described the intricate water re-use systems that are necessary during space missions, enabling food to be grown on board, and ensuring a drinking water supply.
This, Fuglesang said, would both help to inform research, and optimise methods for increased water use efficiency on earth.
‘‘To reduce, some drastic changes will be necessary, especially by the main water users, including industries, energy producers and the agriculture sector.
He told participants that although the ingredients for potential water conflicts exist, such as higher population pressure, climate change, and much of the world’s fresh water being shared by two or more countries, studies show that water sharing is much more likely to lead to cooperation than conflict.

World Water Week: 10 shocking facts about the global water crisis.
As research released for World Water Week (27 August – 1 September) warns that more than 100 cities face flood-related risks similar to those currently being felt in Houston, edie dives deep into the data to pull out 10 alarming statistics which underline why businesses must act NOW.
The impacts are currently being felt in the Texan city of Houston, where at least nine people have reportedly died and more than 30,000 have been forced to evacuate their homes in response to severe flooding caused by Hurricane Harvey.
This has seen the number of people trapped in vehicles increased as a result, and the 103 cities at risk from flooding would do well to learn from the mistakes of Houston.
Globally, 80% of wastewater flows back into natural pools of water and the ecosystem untreated, without being reused.
4) Businesses have lost $14bn in water damages The CDP analysis shows that disclosing companies have lost $14bn because of impacts related to water, with many suffering from production losses as a result of flooding or from a reliance on electricity sourced from hydropower.
In fact, one third of the system is more than 150 years old.
With 49% of the river systems in the country that classified for drinking water, despite not meeting pollution standards, city councils are worried that saltwater intrusion could impact the limited supply of drinking water.
The distance between source and demand has also added to the problems, with water thefts and leakages meaning that around 30% of the city’s water supply is lost before it enters Karachi each year.
Household water use in Jinja is the lowest amongst all cities globally at just 28 litres a day, although water demand is extremely high.

YAOUNDE (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – The Middle East and North Africa region loses about $21 billion each year because of an inadequate supply of water and sanitation, the World Bank said on Tuesday, warning urgent action is needed to prevent ripple effects on stability and growth.
Deaths due to unsafe water and sanitation in some parts of the region, particularly countries affected by conflict, are higher than the global average, it added.
“Water productivity – in other words, how much return you get for every drop of water used – in the Middle East in general is the lowest on average in the world,” said Anders Jägerskog, a specialist in water resources management at the World Bank and one of the report’s authors.
Water governance – in particular, water tariffs and subsidies – must also be addressed, he said.
The region has the world’s lowest water tariffs and spends the highest proportion of GDP on public water subsidies.
Such policies lead to excessive use of already scarce water supplies and are not sustainable, said Jägerskog.
Another challenge is that more than half of the wastewater collected in the region is fed back into the environment untreated.
“Along with better water management, there is room for increasing the supply through non-conventional methods such as desalination and recycling,” Guangzhe Chen, senior director of the World Bank’s global water practice, said in a statement.
Improved water management could bring considerable financial returns, the report noted.
Reporting by Inna Lazareva; editing by Megan Rowling.

Foundation for a project worth Rs 1,500 crore to be laid before Nov for addressing water problems of Palamu.
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Addressing the people after laying foundation stone for setting up of the 220/132 kv and 132/33 KV grid sub-station transmission line in Bhagodih village of Ramna block and inaugurating the Deen Dayal Upoadhyay Gram Jyoti Yojana in this district, he said with the change in time the people also needed to change their thoughts than only it would be possible to usher in development.
He said, small works can help in the upliftment of the society, state and the nation and the people needed to come forward and contribute to ‘Make a New India’ and a new Jharkhand.
He said, without power it was difficult to imagine the modern life and development adding after the formation so far 7 lakh homes have been provided with electricity.
The Chief Minister said, earlier out of 68 lakh families only 38 lakh families had access to power which has been taken as a challenge by the state government and it has set a target to illuminate every home in the state with power by 2018.
The Chief Minister said the state government was working to provide separate feeders for agriculture, household and industrial jobs and was working to ensure that 24 hours of power is provided across the state.
He said, for the benefit of the people 300 modern ambulances would be available to the people which would be reaching to their homes within 15 minutes.
He said the people would also be benefitted by the Chief Minister Health Insurance Scheme adding that people below the poverty line can get insurance of Rs 2 lakh by paying Rs 80 while APL families can avail the same by paying Rs 500.
The Chief Minister said that compared to the previous regime more work has been done in the health care sector of the state but there was a still need to do more work.

New Tool will Help the Textile Industry Reduce Water Consumption.
Water scarcity affects more than 40 per cent of the global population, a number which is projected to rise.
While about 2.5 per cent of the world’s water is freshwater, only 0.5 per cent of that amount is made available to satisfy society’s needs.
With water an essential resource in manufacturing processes, including in the textile sector, reducing water consumption by establishing sustainable production processes can therefore be an advantage for companies as well as the communities they operate in.
Operating in more than 100 countries, their team are dedicated to helping customers make the world safer, smarter and greener.
DNV GL and UNIDO have jointly developed a self-assessment tool to assist textile companies in evaluating the water footprint in manufacturing processes.
Self-Assessment Tools “The textile processing industry is heavily dependent on water in virtually all steps of the production process, from desizing to bleaching and dyeing.
It has one of the most extensive water footprints of all sectors,” said Smail Alhilali, Industrial Development Officer and Manager of the Global Resource Efficiency and Cleaner Production (RECP) program at UNIDO.
“That’s why we have developed this tool, which is a measure for textile companies to obtain a better understanding of their resource efficiency and insight into where they can reduce consumption.” “DNV GL and UNIDO have a common interest in combating water scarcity and improving industry awareness of water-related risks and opportunities.
This is an area where companies have a significant potential for improvement and we are pleased to use our combined expertise to help industries assess and reduce their water footprint,” concluded Antonio Astone, Global Sustainability Manager at DNV GL – Business Assurance.

Two-thirds of the world is covered in water, containing over a billion trillion liters of water.
The amount of H2O on our planet will always remain the same, and won’t run out as such.
According to a 2016 study by the University of Twente in the Netherlands, 4 billion people could face severe water shortages for at least a month every year.
In some regions, people are already severely affected by droughts and water scarcity.
And Pakistan could run dry by 2025, a UN report suggests.
"Locally, the problem is very acute," Johannes Schmiester, a water expert at WWF Germany, told DW.
Around 70 percent of all freshwater on the planet goes into irrigation of fields and feeding of livestock.
But in the industry as a whole – which produces a quarter of Europe’s tomatoes – still needs more water than local water resources can supply.
Researchers say the solution is to consider the entire geographical area and think in units of river basins.
Water consumption is much higher in industrialized countries, though – for example, the average person in Germany uses 140 liters per day.

Michael Phelps joins campaign to help all of us have clean water.
But the Olympic swimming champion and Paradise Valley resident realizes not everyone is fortunate enough to have sufficient clean water for everyday necessities, let alone enough to swim in.
That’s why he’s teaming with Colgate to help raise awareness about wasting water.
“Water is the Earth’s most precious resource, but without realizing it we often take it for granted,” Phelps said in a written statement.
The 23-time Olympic gold medalist is lending his voice and image to a documentary series called “Tales of Two Minutes.” The name highlights the fact that people can waste as much as four gallons of water in the two minutes it takes to brush their teeth if they leave the water running.
The short films, which appear on Colgate’s YouTube channel, showcase stories from across the nation that can change the way we view water.
The first film in the series highlights the extreme water scarcity at St. Michaels Association for Special Education, the only special-needs school in St. Michaels, Arizona, on the Navajo Reservation.
Due to a lack of clean drinking water at the school, students and faculty needed to bring bottled water not only to drink but for basic hygiene and to clean the medical equipment needed by some of the students and adults who attend.
Efforts to improve the situation are starting to pay off.
“As a result of this project, eventually we’re going to have a total water-filtration system for the entire school.

How serious is the risk to Pakistanis from arsenic contamination of groundwater?.
The study’s estimate is that up to 60 million people in Pakistan are consuming the polluted water.
There have been previous studies carried out on a smaller scale locally, indicating similar results.
Groundwater extraction through wells and tube-wells gained much popularity with both people and the government as a safer alternative to surface water from rivers that was contaminated with bacteria.
Once pumped from the ground, this contaminated water is again introduced into the system without proper filtration and treatment processes and makes way into the food and water we consume.
We are exposed to arsenic through drinking contaminated water, using contaminated water in preparing food, and irrigating food crops with the contaminated groundwater.
We have to actively integrate the knowledge available so far into development activities as well as drafting regulations for the water supply sector.
Mitigating the effects of arsenic will require a multi-sectoral approach.
The agriculture sector needs to be bound by strict regulations for groundwater extraction, its sustainable usage, and water quality controls.
Pakistan’s population was recently estimated to be at around 200 million people.

New tool to help reduce water consumption.
DNV GL and the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) have launched a new tool to help the textiles industry manage water consumption in a more sustainable manner.
While about 2.5% of the world’s water is freshwater, only 0.5% of that amount is made available to satisfy society’s needs.
Water is also an important resource in manufacturing processes, including in the textiles sector.
Reducing water consumption by establishing sustainable production processes can therefore be an advantage for companies, as well as the communities they operate in.
Self-assessment tool DNV GL and UNIDO have jointly developed a self-assessment tool to assist textile companies in evaluating the water footprint in manufacturing processes.
“The textiles processing industry is heavily dependent on water in virtually all steps of the production process, from desizing to bleaching and dyeing.
It has one of the most extensive water footprints of all sectors,” said Smail Alhilali, Industrial Development Officer and Manager of the Global Resource Efficiency and Cleaner Production (RECP) programme at UNIDO.
Combating water scarcity “DNV GL and UNIDO have a common interest in combating water scarcity and improving industry awareness of water-related risks and opportunities.
This is an area where companies have a significant potential for improvement and we are pleased to use our combined expertise to help industries assess and reduce their water footprint,” said Antonio Astone, Global Sustainability Manager at DNV GL – Business Assurance.