by Linda Mujuru, originally posted on November 8, 2016

A small crowd gathers, but people soon realize that another person has drowned. This time, it was a young man.

On the other side of the dam, women draw water and wash their laundry, as though nothing has happened.

The dam is unfenced, with huge boulders on its sides. It is the primary water source for the town of Epworth, as well as a primary hazard. It’s common to hear of people killing themselves, murdering others or accidentally drowning in the water. Hundreds of people have died in the dam, according to local estimates. Statistics provided by the Epworth police, who are tasked with retrieving the bodies, reveal that nine people have drowned or committed suicide in the dam since 2014. Data for years prior to 2014 was unavailable.

Two people died in the dam in September 2016 alone according to data provided by the Epworth police.

But for local people, the dam is the main water source, so they keep drawing from it.

Local government officials acknowledge that there has not been a meaningful effort to secure the dam or to ensure safe access to water.

Epworth residents take water from the dam for their washing, even though many people have died in the reservoir.

Gamuchirai Masiyiwa, GPJ Zimbabwe

Epworth, home to more than 160,000 people, is located about 20 kilometers (about 12 miles) from Harare, Zimbabwe’s capital city. The area has individualized water infrastructure which should allow people to have water access in their homes, but due to a lack of pumping capacity the taps here are always dry.

Epworth residents’ drinking water comes from home wells, but those wells usually don’t provide enough water for all their needs, so they go to the dam for water to use for bathing, gardening and other needs. People who don’t have home wells buy 20-liter buckets of water for 10 cents each from people who do have wells.

Eva Muchaneta, the Epworth Councillor for Ward 5, where the dam is located, says that in addition to the hundreds of deaths that have occurred in the dam, the site is also used as a dumping area for dead bodies.

She says the Epworth Council is looking for people who can assist in securing the dam but acknowledges that the efforts have been minimal.

“A security fence was once erected, but it was stolen because no one was protecting the fence,” she says.

Hundreds of people have died in the Epworth Quarry Dam, including people who commit suicide and those who accidentally drown. Dead bodies have also been tossed in the water.

Gamuchirai Masiyiwa, GPJ Zimbabwe

Phillip Mbayimbayi, chairman of the Epworth Home Industry Association, an association of Epworth residents who also own small businesses here, says action must be taken.

“The dam needs to be walled, gated and guarded,” Mbayimbayi says, adding that people need ongoing access to the water for irrigation and other uses.

The community only has access to council water, provided by the local government through taps, once or twice a month, he says.

“The dam water needs to be purified for it to be safe to drink,” he says.

Epworth was once famous for its Balancing Rocks, a towering natural architectural attraction that were featured on Zimbabwean dollar notes before the country stopped printing its own currency in 2009.

The town was also known for its quarry mine, which was in use until 1957, when miners hit the water table and the mine became the present-day dam.

When the miners hit the water, many were trapped and died there, says Henry Kane development coordinator of the Epworth Residence Development Association.

“With the numerous deaths and suicides, there is a myth that there is a spirit of a mermaid (in the dam), but how the mermaid came to be there is a mystery,” he says.

In Zimbabwean culture, mermaids are thought to have influence over the conservation of the environment. They act as powerful guards of the environment, and, it is believed, they hound people who want to damage it.

For local residents, the dam offers both opportunity and peril.

Brickmakers set up their work spaces near the Epworth Quarry Dam, where they take as much water as they need.

Gamuchirai Masiyiwa, GPJ Zimbabwe

Leeroy Njanji is a brick maker who sets up his work space about five meters from the dam, where he gets all of his water. His profit is about $700 per month – a healthy income in this cash-strapped country.

“In the past five years, l have saved more than 35 people from drowning in the dam,” he says. “One of them wanted to kill herself after testing positive for HIV.”

Njanji says he hopes local authorities will safeguard the dam, even though he knows that could curtail his access to the water.

Other residents say they benefit from the dam, too.

Rambo Victor Kazembe teaches swimming lessons there.

“I am searching for swimming talents within children so that we can compete in swimming competitions,” he says. “We can make a difference with these talents.”

Even people who have lost loved ones say they benefit from having access to the dam’s water.

Nyembesi Ranganai lost her infant grandson in the dam nearly 20 years ago. His mother, Ranganai’s daughter, threw him into the dam after she gave birth to him.

Gamuchirai Masiyiwa, GPJ Zimbabwe

Nyembesi Ranganai, 54, lost her infant grandson in the dam in 1997. Ranganai’s daughter gave birth to him, then threw him into the water. She says her daughter served time in prison for that crime.

The memory still causes Ranganai distress, but she acknowledges that she uses the dam’s water.

“I have a small garden and l utilize the dam water for gardening purposes. I also use the water for washing my laundry and for bathing,” she says.

But the dam should be protected, she says.

“If possible there is need to put a wall around the dam and electricity supply to pump out water, so that people do not risk themselves when fetching waterhellip;if a fence is erected people will just steal the fence,” she says.

Linda Mujuru translated some interviews from Shona.

by Bouazza Ben Bouazza and Mehdi El Alem, originally posted on September 24, 2016

Tunis, Tunisia (AP) — Struggling with extremism and economic woes, Tunisia now faces another menace: persistent drought across several regions that is creating new social tensions and threatening farming, a pillar of the economy.

Farmland is too parched to cultivate crops and rural protesters have tried disrupting water supplies to the capital, while one legislator is calling for a “thirst revolt.”

A lack of rain, combined with years of bad resource management, has left reservoirs and dams at exceptionally low levels that could lead to a “catastrophic situation,” said Saad Seddik, who was agriculture minister until last month.

With municipal water supplies periodically cut off, residents of some towns are walking several kilometers (miles) to fetch water from public fountains, loading up donkeys with water canisters — if there’s any left.

“We come here twice a day, first early in the morning before the dam becomes agitated and dangerous. But what we fetch in the morning isn’t enough. So we repeat the trip in the afternoon,” but it’s still not enough to clean the house or wash clothes, said Hadiya Farhani from the town of Sbikha in the central Kairouan region.

Fellow resident Samir Farhani says the government is concentrating on fighting terrorism “while forgetting that thirst could make us turn into terrorists.” Tunisia suffered two major Islamic extremist attacks last year targeting tourists and sees sporadic violence and threats from the Islamic State group in Libya and other radical groups in the region.

“We are thirsty. Give us water, we don’t need work, just water,” he pleaded.

Tunisia has had a string of governments since its Arab Spring revolution in 2011 that have concentrated on fighting extremism and corruption and building a democracy after years of autocracy.

Construction is under way on nine new reservoirs and three desalination plants, but water resource management has not been a top government priority. One recent government response: The minister of religious affairs asked imams to hold prayers for rain.

Most of Tunisia’s water goes to farming, and drought-related agricultural losses are estimated at 2 billion dinars ($905 million) this year, according to the Tunisian Agriculture and Fishing Union. The grain industry alone is expected to lose 793 million dinars ($359 million) for the 2015/2016 season, it said.

Debts are piling up, and water reserves are down nearly a third from recent historical levels, according to the union.

A tomato and potato farmer in Bkalta in the Monastir region, Anis Zouita, normally plants this time of year but fears he won’t be able to irrigate. That could lead to a shortage of produce and higher prices for consumers.

“We are stuck. We need water for this agricultural season,” he said.

He says climate change, and the lack of a long-term government water strategy for this arid country on the edge of the Sahara, are to blame. Prolonged droughts are among many extreme weather phenomena that climate scientists say are becoming more frequent because of man-made carbon dioxide pollution.

The World Bank warned in 2009 that Tunisia was among countries in the region facing water resource risks. Tunisia has long had water issues, but what’s unusual this time is that regions across the country, from north to south, are being hit.

The drought is also worsening social tensions, already simmering because of chronic unemployment.

The town of Fernana has seen weeks of unrest since a young man set himself on fire in desperation — mirroring a similar act in 2010 that unleashed the Arab Spring protests that overthrew Tunisia’s president. This time, the Fernana protesters took out their anger at the establishment by converging on nearby dams and briefly cutting off water supplies to the capital, Tunis.

In another town, Mateur, 70 kilometers (42 miles) from Tunis, protesters angry over a lack of water blocked a road for two days earlier this month and burned tires. Police cleared their roadblock, but water cutoffs continue.

Lawmaker Faycal Tebbini, head of the Farmers’ Voice political party, accuses national authorities of mismanaging the country’s water supplies and wants a “thirst revolt.” He says about 5 billion cubic meters of water flow into the sea every year that could be diverted for farming and residential use, and that 30 percent of water in reservoirs is lost because of leaks in damaged pipes.

He and other rural residents say government attention and water supplies are focused too heavily on richer areas such as the capital and tourist resorts along the Mediterranean coast, while leaving the interior — and its farms that feed Tunisians — parched.

“How can you explain that the Jendouba region, which has large reservoirs, is suffering from thirst? So badly that the No. 1 request from the region’s residents is to have a mouthful of water to drink,” he said.

by Jim Warren, originally posted on September 24, 2016

Canadians have access to so much cheap and plentiful fresh water that we take for granted how valuable it is and have failed to protect our most important and essential natural resource.

A move earlier this year to divert fresh water from the Great Lakes to a Wisconsin town is the thin edge of the wedge and needs to be stopped.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and U.S. President Barak Obama need to intervene in the political process to protect the use of our shared fresh water.

Further, the provinces need to charge private sector companies who sell our ground water a fair and reasonable fee.

Fresh water is becoming more scarce and valuable. While over 70% of the world is covered in water – only 2% of that is fresh water.

According to the United Nations Human Development Report: “1.2 billion people, or almost one-fifth of the world’s population, live in areas of physical scarcity, and 500 million people are approaching this situation. Another 1.6 billion people, or almost one quarter of the world’s population, face economic water shortage.”

It goes on to say: “Water use has been growing at more than twice the rate of population increase in the last century, and, although there is no global water scarcity as such, an increasing number of regions are chronically short of water. Water scarcity is both a natural and a human-made phenomenon.”

Most Canadians don’t realize that, globally, water is a scare resource.

Canada has 7% of the world’s renewable fresh water supply but only 0.49% of the world’s total population. We have so much water we don’t realize its importance.

We also waste a lot of it. We are one of the highest per capita users of water in the world – our residential water use per person per day is 251 litres.

Further, we do not pay the true cost of water. In fact, 44% of Canadian do not even have a metered water supply.

Canada and the United States share access to the greatest single source of fresh water in the world, the Great Lakes. These together hold 20% of the world’s fresh water.

These aren’t a renewable source of fresh water – it’s water left over from melted glaciers. As such Ontario, Quebec and the Great Lake states reached a compact in 2008 that prohibits cities that are not adjacent to the lakes from diverting water to them.

But this summer the eight states agreed to allow Waukesha, Wisconsin to start diverting fresh water from Lake Michigan.

One hundred and twenty three mayors from both the U.S. and Canada are calling on Trudeau and Obama to intervene to protect the fresh water supply. They’re concerned about what will happen if more cities draw on fresh water from the Great Lakes, which are already at historic low levels.

They need to heed the call of these mayors and stop Waukesha from taking Great Lakes water.

Canadians also need to realize the impact bottled water companies are having on ground water levels.

In Ontario, for example, the government only charges the private sector $3.71 for every million litres of water they take and sell to consumers. Since that fee won’t buy you most drinks at Starbucks – why can a private sector company get a million litres for the same cost?

Canada collects appropriate taxes on oil and lumber – we need to do the same for water.

originally posted on September 23, 2016

A new report by the Environmental Working Group shows widespread chromium-6 contamination in drinking water in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and the nation. New Jersey’s Drinking Water Quality Institute has recommended standards for chromium in 2010 but the state Department of Environmental Protection has failed to adopt them.

Chromium-6 is a very dangerous chemical that has been linked to cancer and other serious health impacts. The movie Erin Brockovich was about its effects on the people of Hinkley, Calif. This is particularly troubling for New Jersey since we have found chromium in 150 different water systems here.

Once again the Christie administration has failed to act on protecting us from toxins in our drinking water. The report notes how DEP Commissioner Bob Martin may have blocked submission of the DWQI’s standard recommendations because of spite. He also prevented the Institute from meeting for five years. This is along with stacking the Institute with people tied to the chemical industry. The Christie administration wanted to show that they’re anti-regulation and anti-environment by not moving forward with any new drinking water standards.

They are still blocking the standards on 15 different chemicals including PFC, arsenic, Teflon, TCE, PCE, lead and PFOAs that the DWQI has recommended six years ago. They are making decisions based on political science, not health-based science. The Legislature needs to investigate what’s happening. By blocking the standards for chromium and other chemicals, the administration is putting the health of the people of New Jersey at risk.

Jeff Tittel
Director, New Jersey Sierra Club
Trenton

by Michael Casey, originally posted on December 13, 2016

CONCORD, N.H. — When Roxanne Moore got up to make her morning coffee a few weeks ago, she turned on the faucet and got a burst of water — then nothing came out but air.

That was the last time Moore had water at her home in Kingston, N.H. The 70-year-old woman has been forced to depend on relatives and friends for water to bathe, cook and clean because her private well has gone dry amid this summer’s prolonged drought and dry weather in the Northeastern U.S.

“It’s been very, very difficult,” said Moore. “The things you take for granted like going in the bathroom to wash your face, you can’t do that anymore. You have to have someone do your laundry. You have to leave the house to take baths. I have to make sure I have enough water for the animals. It’s not easy.”

Moore is among the latest feeling the effects of a drought that experts say is the worst in more than a decade. With the region receiving about half the rain it needs this summer, much of northeastern Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire where Moore lives are in an extreme drought.

The U.S. Drought Monitor map, produced by federal agencies and the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, shows parts of southwestern Maine and western New York also in extreme drought, and parts of other states, including Rhode Island, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland and West Virginia, are in a drought or abnormally dry conditions.

The dry weather, expected to last through the fall, has caused problems for farmers, led to water restrictions in many places, raised concerns about a shortened fall foliage season so important to New England’s tourism business, and now is hitting private well owners.

About 2.3 million people, or 20 percent of New England’s population, get their water from private wells, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The hardest hit this summer are those like Moore who have shallow, or what are called dug wells. Those with much deeper, underground wells have largely been spared.

“All of southern New Hampshire and into even parts of central New Hampshire, we have seen it where water levels are extremely low. Anybody with a dug well is at risk,” said Scott Costa, owner of Comac Pump & Well in Kingston, whose company started getting calls in May about dry wells and saw calls spike in the past 45 days.

“We’ve seen the bottom of holes absolutely. You are looking at the bottom and there is no water in it at all,” he said. “Some people have been great with it and roll with it. … Other people will panic, be nervous. We do whatever we can.”

In East Poultney, Vermont, Dave Parker’s company, Parker Water Wells, has two drilling rigs that operate throughout most of the state and parts of New York. He said they’ve been drilling every day.

“We’re re-drilling a lot of them, going deeper, and it’s harder to find water, for sure,” said Parker, who has been in business for 35 years. “It’s definitely drier out than we’ve seen it in 20 years.”

The National Weather Service has gotten reports of privately owned wells in Burrillville, Rhode Island, near the borders of Massachusetts and Connecticut, also drying up.

As the water runs out, several towns and private organizations are lending a hand. The Kingston Fire Department has opened its doors to residents who need water, and Sanborn Regional High School, which serves Kingston, Newton and Fremont, is offering free showers in the evenings.

At Elation Salon in Kingston, owner Laurie Farmer gives free shampoos to people who don’t have water — something she has done in past disasters like ice storms.

“There are always reasons why washing your hair can be a hardship whether you lost your well temporally or you have a power outage,” Farmer said. “It’s easy to sponge bath, but it’s not so easy to really wash your hair.”

For people whose wells have gone dry, the options are limited. They can either wait things out and hope for a wetter fall or spend upward of $10,000 to hire a company to drill an artesian well, which goes down from 100 to 1,500 feet.

Moore isn’t one of the lucky ones. She can’t afford to drill a new well so she is doing everything to conserve the water she has, even putting buckets outside to collect the little rain that’s fallen. She also is lobbying for a tougher ban on outdoor water use in Kingston, whose ban only extends to watering lawns not such activities as washing cars.

“I’m looking ahead to plenty of rain,” Moore said. “Hopefully, it will be supplied. … You just need to have patience and wait.”

Associated Press writers Susan Haigh in Hartford and Wilson Ring in Montpelier, Vermont, contributed to this report.

originally posted on September 15, 2016

Highlights

 Fresh water has been available due to seasonal rain fall in Mekong Delta, South Central Coast and Central Highlands region. The annual flood of Mekong Delta has so far not reached the delta. It is important to note that people in the region depend on the river and its tributaries for food, drinking water, irrigation, transportation and many other aspects of their daily life particularly during the flood season. If the level of water remains the same or slight increases for the next two months, the drought and salt water intrusion could come back in early 2017.

 It is foreseen that with the impact of climate change, sea level rise, reduction of water flow from upstream to lower Mekong basin, natural and man-made disasters have been and will be more intensified and unpredictable. Under that backdrop, UNICEF Viet Nam has engaged strategically with Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development – MARD, the focal agency of the Government of Viet Nam on this work, to discuss a long term cooperation on risk informed programming, disaster preparedness, building resilience and disaster risk reduction – DRR.

 With current situation demand for clean and safe drinking water is needed for household consumption. Lack of safe drinking water and poor hygiene conditions poses high public health risks to vulnerable communities in affected provinces. Impact for affected households is severe and needs are still pertinent particularly in terms of water purification, hygiene promotion, nutritional support and livelihood recovery.

Situation overview and Humanitarian Needs

The ongoing El Niño-induced drought and saline intrusion emergency has adversely impacted the lives of people in 52 out of 64 provinces. In the most affected 18 provinces, 2 million people including 520,000 children and 1 million women, are in need of humanitarian assistance. Of the total 2 million people affected, some 500,000 live in the drought-affected South Central and Central Highlands Regions, and 1.5 million live in the Mekong Delta, where water shortages have been exacerbated by the saltwater intrusion.

With recent rainfall, the situation in the Mekong Delta has improved although impact of saline intrusion is yet to change.

Reduced water use for washing, ablution, and hand-washing, have already resulted in increased incidence of diarrhoea, dysentery, hand, foot and mouth disease, and skin diseases.

The poor access to water has also had an impact on children’s health, exacerbating the prevalence of malnutrition. The forecast of likelihood occurrence of La Niña is now 50-60% compared to previous forecast of 75%. La Niña, which is characterized by cooler than normal water temperatures in the Pacific Ocean, usually results in greater than average rainfall, increasing the risk of large flooding in Mekong delta provinces – particularly in drought-affected areas. The Mekong River delta plays an important role in the Vietnamese economy and it has been severely impacted by a series of unusually drought and large floods. In the dry season the delta is impacted by salinity intrusion and tides. These effects have caused severe human hardship.

Humanitarian leadership and coordination

A joint Government, UN and INGO assessment confirmed the urgent needs in the sectors of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), health and nutrition, and food security. There are challenges to reach the most vulnerable in hard-toreach locations and to strengthen coordination mechanisms at provincial/district levels. The overall sectoral response is led by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) which targets through water trucking the 2 million people affected by the lack of regular access to drinking and domestic water sources. With the onset of rain, especially in the Mekong Delta, water trucking has been reduced. However the emergency response to support purification of water, micro-nutrient supplements, and hygiene behaviour promotion continues to remain important and valued by MARD.

The Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (DARD) in provinces under the leadership of the Provincial People’s Committee (PPC) is coordinating the response at provincial level. In severely affected provinces, the Viet Nam Red Cross (VNRC), Oxfam, Care International, World Vision, and Save the Children are responding and reaching out to the most vulnerable populations, though on a limited scale.

Humanitarian Strategy – The Humanitarian Response – Development Nexus

Based on the results of the 21-24 March joint multi-sector rapid assessment and subsequent monitoring and reporting by Government and partners, the Viet Nam Emergency Response Plan (ERP) outlines the funding requirements to respond to the needs of 2 million people suffering from acute water shortages, 1.1 million who require food assistance, 500,000 in drought-affected areas at risk of water-related diseases, and 66,500 acutely malnourished under-five children and pregnant and lactating women. The UNICEF response strategy involves life-saving support to approximately 358,954 vulnerable people with household water treatment and safe storage, and hygiene promotion to prevent communicable diseases. Interventions will also improve WASH facilities in schools which will be used in conjunction with health centres as entry points for hygiene, sanitation and emergency nutrition interventions. These response activities provide long-term benefit to affected communities’ awareness and coping strategies in future emergency situations, and they serve as an important link between emergency response and on-going WASH and Nutrition resilience. Assessment of the vulnerability to natural disasters in addition to drought is being undertaken and forms the basis for promoting Risk Informed Programming in the drought and saline intrusion affected provinces. Through engagement with Government and other UN agencies, UNICEF aims to prioritise the most vulnerables in affected provinces for further interventions in its on-going programmes, thereby improving long-term community resilience.

Summary Analysis of Programme response

WASH

 UNICEF has procured PUR sachets and Aquatabs for household water purification for approximately 360,000 people in 10 target provinces. As of 14 September all 4 million Aquatab tablets, 15.9 million PUR sachets have arrived in Viet Nam and are ready for distribution. National Center for Rural Water Supply and Sanitation – NCERWASS has printed 80,000 PUR instruction leaflets and 80,000 Aquatabs instruction leaflets to distribute to the targeted beneficiary households. UNICEF has also printed 4,000 booklets of joint UN key messages for emergency situation, 500 posters of handwashing with soaps, 80,000 household WASH booklets focusing on water treatment, and behavior change communications on hygiene and sanitation. They have been delivered to all 10 provinces for distribution together with WASH Supplies in 176 communes of 39 districts in 10 provinces.

 All WASH supply items including instruction leaflets, and all WASH C4D materials have been delivered and ready for distribution to 26,500 people of 5,900 households in 9 communes of 5 target districts in Gia Lai province this week (12-16 Sept).

 59 provincial-level participants from Center for Rural Water Supply and Sanitation – PCERWASS, Center for Preventive Medicine – CPM, Department of Education and Training – DOET, Center for Health Education – CHE, Viet Nam Red Cross – VNRC, and Women Union from 5 Mekong River Delta provinces of Ben Tre, Tra Vinh, Soc Trang, Hau Giang, and Ca Mau attended a TOT training and demonstration on using Aquatabs and PUR sachets, communications for behaviour change, and finance management, organized by NCERWASS in Can Tho from 5- 7 Sept. These officials will form resource trainer teams to roll out training for district and commune facilitators by end of Sept. After TOT training, there will be approximately 1,050 people trained to later guide people on how to use Aquatabs and PUR. A similar TOT training will be organized by Viet Nam Health Environment Management Agency- VIHEMA for 5 Central Highlands and South Central provinces of Ninh Thuan, Binh Thuan, Gia Lai, Kon Tum, and Dak Lak on 22-23 Sept 2016.

 High level meetings between UNICEF – MARD Vice Minister and UNICEF – Red Cross President have opened new windows of opportunities for strategic partnership in current on-going emergency response and future endeavors in disaster risk reduction and resilience development in communities for a safe and enabling environment for women and children. This will form a strategic cooperation framework for 2017-2021. In This woman gets water from a stream 500m away from her house. Water is muddy and dirty (Sept. 2016) immediate future, MARD and UNICEF will co-organize an international workshop to discuss on DRR and its implication on Children to the experience of the on-going humanitarian action and its linkages to development.

 For immediate future, VNRC will be a key implementing partner for the on-going emergency response relating to school WASH, Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS), upscaling Open Defecation Free (ODF), citizen feedbacks in emergency response. In a longer term, a number of potential thematic focuses have been identified, including child protection, Core Commitment to Children (CCC) in Emergency, vulnerability assessment, disaster risk reduction, resilient community development, integrating DRR and CCA into Social Economic Development Plan – SEDP planning, improving damage and need assessment taking into account children’s issues for effective disaster response, and joint efforts in programme fund raising. A UNICEF-VNRC partnership agreement shall be developed and finalized by the end of September to set out specific areas of cooperation.

Nutrition

 In Ninh Thuan, there have been 62 new cases of SAM children detected and admitted for treatment in Ninh Thuan. The total number of SAM cases detected and treated is 712. The number of pregnant and lactating women having been treated with multiple -micronutrient supplements is 5,549 cases. The number of children 6- 23 months receiving multiple micro-nutrient sachets for home food fortification is 13,314 children.

 The implementation has been started in Gia Lai. The total number of SAM cases detected is 855. The number of children 6-23 months identified for receiving multiple micro-nutrient sachets for home food fortification is 19,546 children.

 The national guideline for implementing nutrition emergency intervention was issued by the National Institute of Nutrition – NIN and sent to all provinces. Accordingly, provincial health authorities adapted the guideline and issued instruction to the districts for the implementation.  5,000 MUAC tapes, 30 tons of Ready to Used Therapeutic Food (RUTF) and 8,700,000 multi-micronutrient tablets for pregnant and lactating women, 8.4 million micronutrient powder sachets for 6-23 month children were distributed to the 6 provinces at the end of August 2016. Ninh Thuan, Gia Lai and Tra Vinh had distributed their nutrition supplies to all districts.

Child Protection UNICEF is also exploring ways to support Child Protection by carrying out a sector-specific assessment. A child protection rapid assessment has been conducted in Ninh Thuan province, a south central coast province seriously affected by drought. Led by UNICEF and the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs (MOLISA), in collaboration with Save the Children and Plan International, the assessment looks at emerging or escalated child protection issues due to the magnitude of the drought. The assessment also identifies response gaps and makes recommendations for immediate interventions to address child protection concerns, as well as medium and long-term solutions for strengthened child protection in emergencies.

Key findings and recommendations from the report are as follows:

Key findings:

 Family separation is common during drought period, either long term as some parents have to migrate to other localities to earn living, or short term when other parents have to work in remote paddy fields far away from home for a few days, leaving the children behind either alone, with their siblings to take care of each other, or with the grandparents and relatives for care.

 Child neglect is of concern as the result of family separation, or because parents have to work longer hours, or experience increased stress, thus give less care to the children, both physically and emotionally.

 Sporadic absence from school of children is reportedly more common during the drought period. While primaryschool children skip classes for few days to go with their parents to the paddy field in remote locations, secondary-school children sporadically drop out of school to do part-time works (such as herding cows and sheep, cutting sugar cane and harvesting coffee) or to take care of their younger siblings while parents are working away from home.

 Increased psychological stress of children was also reported during the assessment due to prolonged heat and water shortage, lack of parental care, witnessing domestic violence, and verbal abuse of the parents.

 Violence against children continues to occur, and neglect and the lack of parental care are reported to be the cause of some cases as parents were busy working or working far from home. However, existing data does not show an increase of child abuse incidents as an impact of the drought.

 Child labour was also raised as a concern as it leads to not only dropping out of school but also the risk of exploitation. However, there is no data indicating that the situation is escalated during the drought period

 The local government, agencies and mass organizations have taken a number of interventions and provided various support help the people coping with the drought. Child protection concerns, however, have not been adequately recognized in order to identify effective responses.

Recommendations:

 To strengthen data collection and monitoring of the situation children affected by the drought.

 To pilot short-term foster care model or community-based child friendly shelter to care for children in the community while parents are absent from home for several days in remote field.

 To strengthen capacity of the Child Protection system, especially during natural disaster, particularly through enhanced community child protection network and the role of social work center.

 To integrate CPiE into the welfare sectoral and the local plan to ensure that child protection is considered as a key response in the drought and advocate for additional government budget allocation to welfare sector to address CP issues.

 To set up support groups for parents affected by the drought at community level. These could be places where mothers particularly could receive counseling support.

 To strengthen effort to retain children in schools, including school feeding programmes.

 To strengthen communication on prevention of family separation, neglect, abuse and exploitation of children.

 To increase children’s participation in prevention of and response to the drought’s impact, especially the detection and timely intervention of the risks of abuse, violence and exploitation of children in the areas affected by natural disasters. Findings and recommendations from the assessment was disseminated in Ninh Thuan and the report was shared with leaders of MOLISA for follow-up actions.

Communications for Development (C4D)

C4D activities on life-saving behaviours promotion of Nutrition and WASH in emergencies are under implementation in 10 affected provinces (Ca Mau, Gia Lai, Hau Giang, Kon Tum, Ninh Thuan, Tra Vinh, Ben Tre, Binh Thuan, Dak Lak, Soc Trang). C4D activities aim to response to the impact of both El Niño and La Niña phenomenon. Emergency C4D activities include IEC (Information, Education and Communication) materials’ production and distribution, training, provincial mass media activities, community media (using commune loud speaker system to disseminate messages) and interpersonal communication activities implemented at community and school level. IEC materials on Nutrition and WASH in emergencies were produced and distributed to different groups of target audiences in project site of 10 affected provinces:

1. UNICEF took the leading role in coordinating with other UN agencies to produce the booklet. The booklet was developed based on key emergency messages of WHO, FAO, UN Women, UNDP, and UNICEF and helps provincial C4D managers and planners to develop and implement provincial c4D related activities responding to emergencies. 4,000 copies of the booklet on UN emergency key messages and emergency IEC materials development guidelines were produced and distributed to provincial counterparts of 10 targeted provinces.

2. 80,000 copies of the booklet on Hygiene promotion were printed and are in the process of distribution to households 10 targeted provinces.

3. 500 copies of the Poster on Handwashing with soap were printed and in the process of distribution to national implementing partners and will be used as advocacy tool during the celebration of global hand washing day.

4. 156,000 copies of 2 Leaflets on water treatment using Aquatabs and PUR were printed and are in the process of distribution to households of 10 affected provinces.

5. 180,000 copies of 2 Leaflets on Nutrition were printed and are in the process of distribution to households of 06 affected provinces where nutrition in emergencies is prioritized namely Ca Mau, Gia Lai, Hau Giang, Kon Tum, Ninh Thuan, Tra Vinh.

6. 3,600 copies of the Poster on Nutrition were printed and are in the process of distribution to households of 06 affected provinces (Ca Mau, Gia Lai, Hau Giang, Kon Tum, Ninh Thuan, Tra Vinh).

Besides, the desktop-publishing files of all produced IEC materials were sent to national and provincial counterparts for its customization and uses in future emergency responses.

The IEC materials for school activities are under development. Materials will focus on hygiene promotion/child injury prevention in emergencies and climate change. There are 2 types of materials for school activities facilitated by teacher and student-led activities that will be developed for primary school student. It is recommended to develop a story board for activities facilitated by teacher and board game for student-led activities.

In student-led activities, student will learn through playing game in extra curriculum activities. From 5-7 th Sept 2016: the TOT training in Can Tho was organized for 59 provincial C4D managers and planners (from Tra Vinh, Hau Giang, Ca Mau, Ben Tre, Soc Trang) of emergency of PCERWASS, Preventive Medicine Centre, Health Productive Centre, and Centre for Health Education. In the training, participants were provided within the UN’s key messages in emergencies; Interpersonal communication skill in emergencies response; The guideline for provincial C4D manager and planner on the implementation of C4D activities in emergency at provincial and community levels. After TOT training, provincial C4D managers and planners will organize 1 day-training for commune/village health workers and collaborator and support them in implementing C4D activities at community level.

Education

In the context of the instutionalization and strengthening of the emergency response capacity of the education sector in general, the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) has worked with country partners (UNICEF, Plan International, Save the Children) to refine the Viet Nam’s Framework for Comprehensive Safe School which was adapted and contextualized from the Global Framework. The Comprehensive Safe School for Disaster Prevention in Viet Nam includes 3 main pillars namely the (i) Safe infrastructure for disaster prevention; (ii) Disaster risk management in schools; and (iii) Education for disaster prevention, control, risk reduction and adaptation to climate change in schools. Specific evaluation criteria for each pillar are also included in this framework. The approval of the revised Viet Nam’s Framework for Comprehensive Safe School for national application is expected by the end of this year.

Supply and Logistics

Of the total procurement value, 81% of supplies have been received and are under distribution in 10 provinces.Nutrition supply distribution has been transported to all six targeted provinces. Distribution has been commenced at district and commune level in Ninh Thuan. Tra Vinh and Gia Lai province. WASH supplies – 15,892,800 sachets of water flocculation, 4 million tablets of Aquatabs, 78,000 Buckets, 78,000 filter cloths and 89,200 pieces of anti-bacterial soaps are ready for distribution at the provincial level. All WASH supply items including instruction leaflets, and all WASH C4D materials have been delivered and ready for distribution to 26,550 people of 5,900 households in 9 communes of 5 target districts in Gia Lai province this week (12-16 Sept). 5,000 MUAC tapes, 30 tons of Ready to Used Therapeutic Food (RUTF) and 8,700,000 multi-micronutrient tablets for pregnant and lactating women, 8,400,000 micronutrient powder sachets for 6- 23 month children were distributed to the 6 provinces at the end of August 2016. Ninh Thuan, Gia Lai and Tra Vinh had distributed their nutrition supplies to all districts.

Nutrition, WASH and Supply team are spending more time in the field for effective distribution monitoring. Nutrition monitoring was initiated late August and is ongoing in the six coverage provinces of Ninh Thuan, Kon Tum, Gia Lai, Tra Vinh, Hau Giang and Ca Mau, WASH monitoring activities kicked off last week in the key priority provinces.

Of the total procurement, 19% balance of supplies are enroute to the country and are expected in late September, early October, 2016. This includes: Resomal – 6 cartons (or 600 sachets), F-100 therapeutic- 30 cartons (or 2700 sachets), F-75 therapeutic -50 cartons (or 6,000 sachets), balance of Micronutrient tablets -4,200 packs of 1000 tablets and multiple micronutrient -50,000 packs of 30 sachets, are expected to arrive in the country by 3rd week of Sept by air and Sea transport. The last emergency shipments of therapeutic spread – 1450 cartons of 150 sachets and Micronutrients tab 4,800 packs of 1000 tablets are expected to arrive in the country late Sept or mid Oct, 2016. Partial Bucket, Soap, filter cloths procurement by NCERWASS will also be delivered by late September.

Funding

So far, the ERP (seeking US$48.5 million) is 33% funded thanks to contributions received from CERF, ADB, Government of Japan, ECHO, USAID, DFAT, Government of Lao PDR, Government of Thailand, Government of New Zealand and various other sources. UNICEF has received about US$1.5 million from CERF for the humanitarian response for 6 months and US$2.5 million from the Government of Japan for 9 months for WASH and Nutrition sectors.

This is the second of a three-part series on the impact of water shortages around the world.

by Chong Koh Ping, originally posted on November 1, 2016

China has a water crisis. Almost 20 per cent of the world’s population live in the country, but it has only 7 per cent of the world’s fresh water.

This means each Chinese person has much less fresh water to use every year, compared with people in most other countries.

Beijing, the capital city, is not spared. According to Xinhua news agency, the city’s average annual rainfall of 500mm can provide water for only a population of 12 million. But more than 20 million people live in the city.

On average, every Beijing resident has access to only 100 cubic metres of water annually – enough water to fill only 4 per cent of an Olympic-size swimming pool.

In late 2014, the South-North Water Diversion Project went operational, channelling water from the south to the north.

Despite the constant flow of water from the south, Dr Pan Anjun, deputy director-general of the Beijing Water Authority, cautioned recently that Beijing remained highly water-stressed due to its natural arid conditions and the chronic shortage over the years.

Situations elsewhere across the nation are equally challenging. A third of the water in the rivers and more than two-thirds of the water in the lakes is undrinkable, said the Ministry of Water Resources.

Natural disasters, such as floods and droughts, and man-made issues like pollution further exacerbate the problem as the country industrialises and urbanises.

Every summer since 2008, the Yellow Sea near Qingdao in eastern Shandong province turns green with algae. In 2013, the algae covered 28,000 sq km, almost 40 times the size of Singapore. The algae was said to be linked to the discharge of fertilisers and nitrogen-rich sewage into the sea.

In the same year, drinking water in Shanghai came under threat due to illegal dumping of some 16,000 dead pigs in the Huangpu River that supplies water to the city.

The Yangtze River, the country’s longest river, is also plagued by chemical pollution. According to Xinhua, more than 400,000 chemical enterprises are found along the middle and lower reaches of the river. This has resulted in a 600km pollution belt along the river, with more than 300 hazardous pollutants.

Contamination from farming and factories has made more than 80 per cent of water from underground wells unfit for drinking and bathing, the Chinese media reported in April.

The rural poor in China, such as those living in the western regions, are especially hard-hit due to the mountainous terrain and the climate. Only 55.4 per cent of the rural population have access to tap water, said the World Health Organisation.

Non-governmental organisations such as the China Association of Poverty Alleviation and Development as well as Lien Aid, a Singapore-based international non-profit organisation, have been working with student village officers to implement water projects since 2012. They help villagers in Yunnan, Guizhou and Chongqing to get fresh water. The student village officers are university graduates picked by the central government to help facilitate the development of rural communities.

Ms Long Lifeng, 32, a student village officer in Wuli township in south-western Guizhou, told The Straits Times that the water project she helped to implement last year was one of the most meaningful tasks she had completed since arriving at Huangtian village in 2011.

After the building of a centralised water supply system, the nearly 400 households there no longer have to make trips – up to four daily – to get water.

They now enjoy water that flows from taps in their houses.

“This project helped solve the biggest problem in their lives,” said Ms Long. “Now, they don’t have to spend time fetching water, and can focus on working in the fields or on other things.”

by Lisa Nikolau, originally posted on October 31, 2016

Climate change is causing glaciers in the Bolivian Andes to melt at an alarming rate, according to a recent study, posing serious risks to the millions of people who rely on the glaciers for drinking water, hydropower and irrigation.

Researchers used satellite images to measure change in glacier area and published their findings earlier this month in The Cryosphere.

The findings are alarming: The glaciers covering the Bolivian Andes have shrunk by nearly half since the 1980s, and the melting ice has left behind at least 25 unstable glacial lakes capable of causing sudden and catastrophic floods.

The glacier loss will also affect the 2.3 million people in La Paz and El Alto, which the study’s authors say get around 30 percent of their water from glacial supplies during the dry season. Outside of these cities, the melted water is also an important source of drinking water and hydroelectric power for rural mountain villages.

“Most glaciers will be gone or much diminished by the end of the century – so where will the water come from in the dry season?” said Simon Cook, a lecturer at the Manchester Metropolitan University in the U.K. and lead author of the study, in a press release.

“Big cities like La Paz are partially dependent on meltwater from glaciers,” he said. “But little is known about potential water resource stress in more remote areas. Much more work needs to be done on this issue.”

Bolivia has struggled with water scarcity for years. The problem captured international attention in 2000 when the World Bank encouraged the Bolivian government to sell the public water system to the Bechtel Corp., granting the company control over the city’s water for four decades with an average annual profit of 16 percent.

The deal caused monthly water bills to skyrocket for low-income households. Mass public protests framed water privatization as a violation of basic human rights and successfully forced the Bolivian government to cancel the contract in what was later known as Bolivia’s ‘Water Wars.’

The country’s water supply has since remained in public control, and nongovernmental organizations such as Water for People have developed local initiatives to increase access to clean water in rural parts of the country.

President Evo Morales’s administration has also made repeated promises to attain 100 percent coverage of drinking water and basic sanitation by 2025.

Deputy Minister of Water and Sanitation Ruben Mendez reported Friday that drinking water coverage has reached 84.7 percent – among the best coverage per capita in Latin America. In rural areas of the country, Water for People estimated that access now hovers around 76 percent.

Still, some experts are concerned that Morales’s goal is will not be reached amid increasingly severe droughts, which have been exacerbated by El Niño. This year’s drought is considered to be the worst drought of the last quarter century and one of the three worst in the last 65 years. In response, the Bolivian government has allocated $6.9 million to provide water-starved households and farmers with water, seeds, forage and balanced food for livestock.

The drought has also contributed to the loss of Bolivia’s second-largest body of water, Lake Poopo, which was officially declared evaporated last month. Huffington Post reported hundreds, if not thousands, of people have lost their livelihoods and been displaced after years of rising temperatures and under-regulated mining activity.

by Karen Graham, originally posted on October 31, 2016

The next president of the U.S., whoever it may be, will have to act fast to help the Colorado River continue serving millions of city-dwellers, farmers, Indian tribes and recreational users in the Southwestern U.S.

The challenges surrounding competition for the already scarce Colorado River’s waters are nothing new. But they have grown in complexity after 16 years of on-and-off drought conditions in the Southwest.

According to the Associated Press, a recent survey by researchers at the University of Colorado found that 65 decision-makers, including water managers, municipal and agricultural customers, conservationists and government officials at the tribal, state and federal levels all agreed that contingency plans and water-use agreements between the seven states and Mexico that rely on the water must be firmed up.

originally posted on October 30, 2016

Thiruvananthapuram: A severe drought is looming large over Kerala as the state has received deficient rainfall during the south-west monsoon.

There has been a sharp decrease of rainfall to the tune of 34 per cent during the south-west monsoon, according to figures released by the Indian Meteorological Department here.

From June 1 this year to September 30, Kerala received 1352.3 mm rains against the normal rainfall of 2039.7 mm, a deficiency of 34 per cent. There has been no rain in October and if this situation continues, there will be drought-like situation, IMD, Thiruvananthapuram Director S. Sudevan, said.

“If the North East Monsoon fails then there will be problems in different sectors — agriculture, power etc”, he told PTI.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, has also said that the state was heading for a “severe” drought as Kerala had received deficient rains in the south-west monsoon. Though the north-east monsoon was yet to set in, the state had not received pre-monsoon showers, he said.

“A huge danger is lurking in the state in the form of drought as the south west monsoon was deficient”, Vijayan had said at a function on Saturday.

“If this situation continues, the state is heading for a severe drought. We need to take precautions,” he had said. To tackle the situation, the government was also keen to encourage rain water harvesting, he said. There has been an average reduction of 22 per cent water in the state’s dams when compared to the water storage in September last year. The state was also gearing up to take measures to tackle scarcity of drinking water which is likely to be faced by the state due to deficient monsoon, according to Water Resources Minister Mathew P. Thomas.

The government also has plans to rejuvenate at least 10,000 private temple ponds of the total 40,000 in the state. The chief minister had convened a high level meeting on October 13 to work out plans to meet the impending drought situation. Kerala is now pinning all hopes on the north east monsoon which is yet to set in, he said.