A concerted global action plan under G8 leadership is urgently needed to resolve a growing water and sanitation crisis that causes nearly two million child deaths every year, according to a UN report published yesterday.
The report, "Beyond scarcity: power, poverty and the global water crisis", estimates that unclean water and poor sanitation is the world's second-biggest killer of children. Some 1.8 million under the age of five die as a result of diarrhoea each year, more than six times the number who die from violence.
Overall, some 1.1 billion people lack safe water and 2.6 billion lack access to sanitation, while the UN estimates that the various health problems this creates have a daily impact on 50 per cent of the population of developing countries.
The report also shows that the divergence in development trends between the world's richest and poorest countries is increasingly marked.
While the world as a whole has seen unprecedented growth over the past 30 years, the prosperity has not been evenly shared and sub-Saharan Africa in particular is stagnating.
"When it comes to human development, the rising tide of global prosperity has lifted some boats faster than others, and some boats are sinking faster," the report states.
In its index of human development, which rates countries on wealth, life expectation and education, Norway was judged the best to live in and Niger in west Africa was in last place, unchanged from last year.
People in Norway are more than 40 times wealthier than people in Niger and they live almost twice as long.
The combined income of the 500 richest people in the world now exceeds that of the poorest 416 million people, while in the development index's 31 lowest- ranked countries - covering 9 per cent of the world's population - average life expectancy is 46 years, or 32 years less than the highest-ranking nations.
"Being born on the wrong street in the global village carries with it a large risk in terms of survival prospects," the authors observe.
Sub-Saharan Africa, where tens of millions of people face an Aids pandemic and chronic shortages of clean water and sanitation, stands as an anomaly across nearly all indices.
There, life expectancy is significantly lower now than it was in the 1970s, with the region accounting for almost two-thirds of the estimated 40 million people infected with HIV worldwide.
A person in Swaziland can expect to live to 31.3 years of age, while in neighbouring South Africa, the continent's most advanced economy, average life expectancy is only 47. That compares to 82.2 years in Japan.
The UN report contends that a concerted effort to improve access to clean water and sanitation would have an effect across a range of other areas.
"When it comes to water and sanitation, the world suffers from a surplus of conference activity and a deficit of credible action," Kevin Watkins, lead author of the report, said. "National governments need to draw up credible plans and strategies for tackling the crisis in water and sanitation. But we also need a Global Action Plan - with active buy-in from the G8 countries," he said.
The report proposes agreeing and implementing a human right on water and sanitation.
Minister of State for Irish Aid Conor Lenihan said the report, which showed Ireland to be one of the top five donors for percentage share of bilateral aid in these areas, showed where progress was being made and where greater attention was needed. The Government's support for water and sanitation projects tripled between 2000 and 2004, and this year Ireland provided 60,000 people with water and sanitation in Zambia.
Labour's spokesman on foreign affairs, Michael D. Higgins, welcomed the report and said its recommendations were generally positive, though it did not resolve the "fundamental issue" on "universal provision of water as a basic right".