I attended the 3^rd Asian Sanitation Dialogue from May 27-29, 2014 sponsored by the Asia Development Bank. There were more than 200 adult attendees from Asia and the Pacific and 10 of us youth participants.

 

We talked about Sanitation and its importance to everyday life. We discussed about 3 main problems of water which are either (1) too much, (2) too little or (3) too much water. Some facts:

o   1.7 billion people around the world lack improved sanitation,

o   780 million still practice open defecation and

o   80% of rivers in Asia and the Pacific are in poor health.

That means that we will not meet our MDG target by 2015 for safe drinking water and sanitation. Also, the global demand for water will increase by 55% by 2030.

 

 

Now here?s a little Water 101 that I learned when I listened to an Insight Thursday presentation:

On Hydraulics - Water flows downhill? No, water flows to where the money is!

On Hydrology - Is it stationary? No, Climate change has put an end to that!

 

At the end of the conference, we were given a chance to state our requests and ask questions. We proposed a Youth Sanitation Ambassador Initiative, which means we will have Youth Sanitation Ambassadors, who will take the lead in educating youth around Asia and the Pacific in the implementation of laws connected to sanitation.  This would be under the ADB Youth Initiative.

In the Philippines, I learned that we have all the laws on water and sanitation, but we lack implementation and enforcement. "Often the water crisis is not because of scarcity of water but because of inadequacy of governance."-Ian Makin (Water Specialist at ADB)