L-R: Engr Oladimeji Botimi, Director Watr Supply Ondo state, RUWASSA; Dr. Musa Ibrahim; Permanent Secretary FMWR; Engr.
Suleiman Adamu, Minister of Water Resources; Mrs. Elisie Ofili, Deputy Director Standard organisation of Nigeria and Mr. Emmanuel Awe, Director water supply, FMWR at the unveil of Nigeria Standard for Drinking Water Quality, in Abuja.
Speaking on Thursday during the unveiling of the NSDWQ in Abuja, Engr.
Suleiman Adamu, Minister of Water Resources, noted that the ministry had been assigned the responsibility of enforcement, saying, not much had been done in respect to enforcement of standard with water producer carrying on with business without regard for the quality of drinking water supplied to the people.
He said that the water quality laboratory had the responsibility for water quality surveillance and enforcement of the standards.
Quoting the World Health Organisation (WHO), he said, “diseases related to drinking water contamination represent a major burden on human health and interventions to improve the quality of drinking water provide significant benefits to the health and wellbeing of the people.” Dr. Musa Ibrahim, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Water Resources said much progress had been made in providing water supply facilities in Nigeria.
He explained that “according to data from 2016 multiple indicator cluster survey 5 (MICS 5), access to improved drinking water supply sources is estimated at 64.1% in the country.
Giving the scale of the challenge, this is highly remarkable achievement.” He noted that the quality of water could be highly compromised during collection, trough transport to point of use, so that for the same period the percentage access to safe drinking water is 32.1%, adding that the NSDWQ NIS-554-2015 will improve quality of water consumption.
He said, “FMWR have been given the responsibility to enforce the standard any state agency that goes away with what we have in the standard will be penalized, we have a fine that water board will pay if the water is not according to standard.
“For the private suppliers of water we have a standard that they must collect sample of their water for test in any water laboratories of their choice every year to carry out analysis to be sure that what they are drinking is safe, adding that enforcement of standard on private water supply and owners borehole will be carried out by the water laboratories.”

LAGOS, Feb. 22 (Xinhua) — Nigeria on Thursday launched the Standard for Drinking Water Quality to promote the availability of safe drinking water for all citizens.
The availability of clean water supply was the focus of President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration, Minister of Water Resources, Suleiman Adamu, said at the launching ceremony in Abuja.
The standard sets limits for water contaminants that are hazardous to health and also provides guidelines for meeting the mandatory limits for safe water.
Quoting a World Health Organization (WHO) report, the minister said it was estimated that about 60 percent of all diseases in developing countries were related to consumption of unsafe water and poor sanitation.
Adamu said diseases related to drinking water contamination represented a major burden on national health care delivery.
He said Nigeria had made some progress in expanding the citizens’ access to improved water supply with the current access standing at 67 percent.
The minister however said it was saddening that not much had been achieved in respect of enforcement of standards, adding that water producers still operated without due regard to quality of water.
In 2005, the National Council on Water Resources recognized the need to produce a national standard for drinking water quality for the country.
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Congressman Greg Gianforte recently introduced the Clean Water for Rural Communities Act, legislation if passed it will improve Montana’s rural water infrastructure.
“The Clean Water for Rural Communities Act will better ensure more than 20,000 Montanans in our rural communities have a steady supply of water.” The Clean Water for Rural Communities Act authorizes the Dry-Redwater Regional Water System and the Musselshell-Judith Regional Water System, which are two Bureau of Reclamation rural water projects.
Gianforte’s new measure will provide water treatment to 22,500 residents in Dawson, Fergus, Garfield, Golden Valley, Judith Basin, McCone, Musselshell, Prairie, Richland, Wheatland.
Leaders of the Dry-Redwater Regional Water Authority and the Central Montana Regional Water Authority praised Gianforte’s effort to complete crucial rural water infrastructure projects in Montana.
“The Dry-Redwater Regional Water Authority’s users in Eastern Montana have waited for the processes in Washington to work for them and bring quality drinking water to the area.
Thirteen years ago, DRWA asked for assistance from the federal government to help provide clean, safe water.
Trillions of dollars have been dispensed from Washington since, yet still we wait for authorization of our water system,” said Jerry Meissner, chairman of the Dry-Redwater Regional Water Authority.
“We are thankful for the help of Congressman Gianforte and for his introduction of legislation supporting our efforts.
It is time for Congress to pass this bill to authorize this Water System and help our president build infrastructure.” “After more than 12 years of preparation and completing the planning required by the Rural Regional Water Act, after spending more than $4 million, after approval of our planning process and findings by the Bureau of Reclamation, and after multiple other attempts to gain congressional authorization of our project, we are hope Congressman Gianforte’s efforts will finally result in authorization of the Musselshell-Judith Rural Water Project,” said Monty L. Sealey, project administrator with the Central Montana Regional Water Authority.
We appreciate Congressman Gianforte’s resolve to see this legislation enacted into law.” Dominick

OKEMOS, Mich. February 21, 2018 Sixty-one schools across Michigan will soon receive new water fountains/bottle filling stations, thanks to $200,000 in funding from the Delta Dental Foundation (DDF) and MESSA.
The schools are winners of MESSA and DDF’s “Rethink Your Drink: Water’s Cool at School program,� designed to encourage children to drink more water during the school day.
(The list of winners follows this press release.)
“Not only are sugar-sweetened beverages like pop and juice drinks bad for your teeth, they can contribute to other health issues such as obesity and Type 2 diabetes.
MESSA is committed to supporting education employees as they look to improve their own health while modeling good examples for their students.� Winning schools will have old drinking fountains replaced with Elkay water fountain/bottle filling stations by Oak Park-based Balfrey & Johnston.
For more information, visit http://www.deltadentalmi.com.
More information at messa.org.
2018 “Rethink Your Drinkâ€� winners:     Alcona Elementary, Middle and High Schools, Lincoln     Arborwood Elementary Campus, Monroe     Athens High School, Troy     Atlantis High School, Flint     Attwood Elementary School, Lansing     Bangor High School, Bangor     Beech Elementary School, Redford Township     Blesch Intermediate School, Menominee     Bridgeport High School, Bridgeport Township     Bullock Creek Elementary School, Midland     Carrollton High School, Saginaw     Chatterton Middle School, Warren     Chippewa Valley High School, Clinton Township     Detroit Cristo Rey High School, Detroit     Dudley STEM Elementary School, Battle Creek     Eau Claire High School, Eau Claire     Escuela Avancemos Academy, Detroit     Ford Early Learning Center, Ypsilanti     Gier Elementary School, Hillsdale     Harrison Middle School, Harrison     Hatherly Educational Center, Warren     Holden Elementary School, Warren     Inland Lakes Elementary School, Indian River     International Academy at Hull, Benton Harbor     Ionia Middle School, Ionia     Johannesburg-Lewiston High School, Johannesburg     Kolb Elementary School, Bay City     Lake Shore High School, Saint Clair Shores     Lincoln Elementary School, Zeeland     Lockwood Elementary School, Eaton Rapids     Luther L. Wright School, Ironwood     Mesick Jr./Sr.
High School, Mesick     Montrose Hill-McCloy High School, Montrose     Moon School, Muskegon     Morrish Elementary School, Swartz Creek     Mt.
Morris Middle School, Mt.

Expected to impact over 10,000 lives in rural Bengaluru BENGALURU: Tesco in Bengaluru, in partnership with Rotary Bangalore Whitefield Central, today announced the inauguration of its community-based clean water programme in Naganayakanakote, a village on the outskirts of Bengaluru city.
This initiative began in 2017 and is now giving the villagers access to clean drinking water.
The project is expected to impact 10,000 lives in the Naganayakanakote village and surrounding areas.
This initiative assures access to clean and safe drinking water as a key focus area for the village.
Through community water plants, under-served communities will gain ready access to high-quality potable water, and meet or exceed World Health Organisation (WHO) standards and Indian IS1 0500 standards for drinking water.
For Tesco in Bengaluru, every little step makes a big difference.
Our multi-stakeholder programme helps us spread the right awareness and impacts the economic health, education and productivity levels of households in the community and its surrounding areas.
Rtn.
The need of the hour is clean drinking water that is affordable for all, and thus leads to long-term sustainability; Tesco in Bengaluru is helping us drive this cause further.’’ The Naganayakanakote village in Bengaluru is surrounded by many larger villages such as Doddadunnasandra, Samethanahalli, Muthkur, Muthasandra, Anugondanahalli and a few smaller villages as well.
The programme also aims to facilitate distribution from the Naganayakanakote hub to these villages for clean water access.

These include how much residents are reducing their demand.
Phase two will be triggered when the six big dams supplying Cape Town reach a storage level of 13.5 percent.
This leaves just enough water to supply critical services – including sufficient water to distribute to collection sites across the city.
In phase two the plan is to roll out distribution points across the city.
Site selection is unlikely to be evenly distributed across the city, because distribution sites will depend on existing water pipelines.
Avoiding Day Zero Cape Town is using a relatively simple model to manage water in an effort to move circumstances from a critical zone, and potential failure, to a position where the risk of running out of water is greatly reduced.
Reduced demand is one way of postponing Day Zero.
Some irrigation boards have closed off their water supply, and farmers are reducing the amount they draw from the Western Cape water supply system.
A final factor is that new projects will also bring additional water from tapping into the aquifers and from desalination.
There are encouraging signs suggesting that the city will get through this difficult period.

Cape Town – Water use is growing at twice the rate of population growth, and, if this trend is not reversed, two-thirds of the global population will face water stress by 2025.
This is according to Dr Isabel Bortagaray, a Human Science Research Council (HSRC) research fellow, who presented a video conference seminar in Cape on Tuesday on “An Innovation-based, Sustainable and Inclusive Water Policy Research Agenda: Questions from the Uruguayan Case”.
Bortagaray is based at the Institute for Sustainable Development, Innovation and Social Inclusion at the University of the Republic, Uruguay.
She said water security was of concern world over and constitutes one of the main global risks in its impact on development in general and on the achievement of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) in particular.
Bortagarey said the complexity and uncertainty related to water and climate change, and the pervasiveness of water throughout the different SDGs, calls for a policy in which innovation is prioritised.
She said innovation was required not only because water services were still missing large groups of the population, but because water quality and water management imposed technological and institutional challenges.
Bortagaray said water use was growing at twice the rate of the population growth.
Bortagaray said the agro-industrial sector accounted for 78% of all exported goods in 2016 and currently produces food for 28million people.
She said irrigation was responsible for the bulk of water use in Uruguay, accounting for 84%.
Uruguay’s water policy includes access to drinking water and sanitation as fundamental human rights, prioritised use of water for human consumption, sustainable management of hydrographic basins, and citizen participation in the planning, management and control of water.

Cholera is a water-borne diarrhoeal disease that can kill within hours if left untreated, but is easily cured with oral rehydration, intravenous fluids and antibiotics.
Clean water and hygiene standards are critical to controlling transmission.
Muluzi bemoaned that this was a worsening trend as the number of cholera cases are increasing in Malawi.
He said health officials have begun a media blitz to educate people about the risk of cholera and what steps they can take to avoid contracting it.
Muluzi said the main strategy for cholera control remains use of safe and potable water, good sanitation, and personal hygiene.
The new cholera cases have been reported from three districts namely Salima, Karonga and Lilongwe with 550 cases in total as some patients are still admitted in health facilities across the country.
“Although the cholera cases are rising, it is not yet an outbreak, I should just urge all Malawians to take care when it comes to sanitation issues like washing hands after visiting the toilet, boiling drinking water and many other measures that will prevent the disease from spreading,” advised Muluzi.
UNICEF’s representative to Malawi Johannes Wedenig told local media that “as long as people in Malawi don’t change the behaviour of using unsafe water, it’ll be very difficult to contain”.
He urged Malawians to follow strict sanitation rules and stressed the importance of hand-washing before eating or preparing food.
Another 450,000 doses are expected to arrive soon for distribution in the rest of the country, added Muluzi, confirming the current toll.

This notorious epidemic that knows no class broke out in October last year and has so far claimed about 80 lives while 3,635 people have been treated.
It is believed that lack of access to clean drinking water and better sanitation are among the factors that ignited the outbreak of cholera in the capital city.
She then explains how the outbreak of cholera in the unplanned settlement has negatively affected the lives of many people due to water shortages and the inadequacies of water infrastructure.
This year, Government has allocated K564.5 million for water and sanitation in the national budget.
According to the National Water and Sanitation Council (NWASCO), access to water supply in urban areas stands at 86 percent, while in rural areas it is at 48 percent.
Daniel Nkhuwa, a geology lecturer in the School of Mines at the University of Zambia, suggested that the capital city should shift from Lusaka to another place where proper city planning will be possible.
He said there is need for a complete uproot of the capital city to some new location whose geology could allow for on-site sanitation system.
Professor Nkhuwa’s presentation was entitled: ‘Is sustainable urban water development and prevention of waterborne diseases attainable in Lusaka under its current sanitation practices?’ While a lot still needs to be done to correct the current situation, especially in Lusaka, efforts on the ground are slowly yielding fruit.
It is for this reason that Ministry of Water Development, Sanitation and Environmental Protection principal engineer for rural water supply and sanitation, Abel Manangi, called on engineers to influence change in the prevention of waterborne diseases through timely advice.
“We hope the team of engineers working with Government will consider re-planning or re-development of cities and slums where disease outbreaks are frequent,” Mr Manangi noted.

According to UNICEF, there are 2.1 billion people in the world that do not have access to safe drinking water.
It is amazing to think that in the near future, there is a possibility that many people will die from a lack of drinking water.
One has to examine what happened to Cape Town to understand what could possibly happen here.
A concerned population rises, a major drought hits, and the elements are in place for a real life disaster movie.
Nature Conservancy did a global survey of water supplies for cities.
In fact, Mexico City has 21 million people living there, and they only have access to running water for just part of the day.
Ways to Conserve Water There are steps we can all take to make sure that our ancestors will have enough clean water to live off of as well and ensure that this planet can keep on supporting life.
Waiakea Water has been growing year by year ever since.
Waiakea Water was originally created to make positive changes throughout the world.
With the lack of clean water available to many regions of the world, this is where Waiakea definitely steps up to the plate.