SDG 6 – Clean Water and Sanitation

Earth year 4,492,056,017
Mother Earth/ Gaia‘s Blog

Mankind, My children

In my first blog post I asked that you commit to following my blog posts for a few weeks to give me a chance to explain the most important issues affecting our joint survival. Subsequent Blog posts have started to give you some facts about the big and important Global issues that need to be addressed and what sorts of actions you personally could take. In today’s Blog post I want to talk about SDG 6 – CLEAN WATER AND SANITATION.

The problem

Water scarcity affects more than 40% of the Global population and 1.7 billion people live in areas where the water usage is greater than the ability to replenish the water being used. Around 2.4 billion people lack access to basic sanitation services such as toilets or latrines and 80% of wastewater resulting from human activities is discharged straight into rivers and seas without any pollution removal. At least 1.8 billion people have to use drinking water that is polluted with human toilet waste. Around 70% of the water taken from rivers lakes and aquifers is used for irrigation.

Do you feel guilty when watching TV reports about the suffering of the poor in developing countries and seeing little children carrying large buckets of dirty water for miles to their homes?. Are you frustrated that not enough is done to stop the inequality and unfairness that denies opportunities and clean water to hundreds of millions in much of the world?. Now is your chance to do something to change the world!

The facts

1. 663 million people do not have access to improved water sources
2. 1000 children die each day (around 365,000 / year) due to preventable water and sanitation related diarrhoeal diseases
3. 840,000 die each year due to lack of clean drinking water
4. 1.8 Billion people have to use drinking water that is polluted with human toilet waste

WCYDo (wich-ee-do What Can You Do?)

1. Drink less bottled water. 16 litres of water is needed to make 1 litre of bottled water.
2. If you must drink bottled water, use reusable bottles to stop billions of discarded plastic bottles ending up on oceans and killing wildlife.
3. Donate to charities such as www.dri.edu, water.org
4. Share the facts about clean water and sanitation with family and friends.

Encourage others to join us and to visit our social accounts to sign up for our newsletter and information about our proposed WCYDo APP. See you next week on blog post, that will discuss SDG 7 – Good Jobs.

 

Earth year 4,492,056,017
Mother Earth/ Gaia‘s Blog number 7

Mankind, My children

In my first blog I asked that you commit to following my blogs for the next few weeks to give me a chance to explain the most important issues affecting our joint survival. Subsequent Blogs have started to give you some facts about the big and important Global issues that need to be addressed. In today’s Blog I want to talk about Affordable and Clean Energy 

The problem 

Lack of access to affordable, reliable energy supplies is a constraint to human and economic development. About 1 billion people live without electricity and more than 3 billion have to rely on wood, charcoal, animal and crop waste  or other solid fuels to cook their food and to heat their homes. Nearly 4 million people die prematurely from illnesses attributable to household pollution from inefficient cooking practices and businesses cannot thrive and grow where electricity is not available or is only intermittent and unreliable. Since energy contributes to 60 % of the Greenhouse gases causing climate change, we need to move to renewable sources.

Do you feel guilty and helpless when seeing TV reports about children sitting in semi darkness trying to do their homework by firelight or families  having no choice but to cook their meals on polluting and smoky energy sources ? Now you can do something to help make things better  

The facts:

1. 291 million children ( 40% ) attend primary schools without electricity 
2. Girls have to collect most of the fuel for their families so often miss school 
3. 7 out of 10 African business lack reliable electricity 
4. Energy contributes 60 % of the greenhouse gases causing climate change so we must urgently support renewable energy sources 

wcydo (wich-ee-do – What Can You Do?) 

1. Buy fair trade fruit once a week to help poor farmers
2. Support charities such as www.betterenergy.org  
3.  Join and support a pressure group to demand action www.globalcitizen.org 
4. Share the facts about energy to family and friends so they do it too

Encourage others to join us and to visit www.wcydo.com to sign up for our newsletter and information about our proposed wcydo APP.  See you next week on blog 8.