It’s another year and another World Water Day, a day coordinated by UN-Water in collaboration with governments and partners, is fast approaching. The World Water Day 2017 is coming up on March 22 and is all about wastewater. You may ask, why wastewater? That’s because the main focus of the UN’s World Water Day is on how we should be reducing and reusing water rather than letting water go down the drain. We are taking action to tackle the global water crisis.
Global Water Crisis
Today, there are over 663 million people living without a safe water supply close to home, spending countless hours queuing or trekking to distant sources, and coping with the health impacts of using contaminated water. The Sustainable Development Goals, launched in 2015, include a target to ensure everyone has access to safe water by 2030, making water a key issue in the fight to eradicate extreme poverty.
Globally, the vast majority of all the wastewater from our homes, cities, industry and agriculture flows back to nature without being treated or reused – polluting the environment, and losing valuable nutrients and other recoverable materials. Instead of wasting wastewater, we need to reduce and reuse it. In our homes, we can reuse greywater on our gardens and plots. In our cities, we can treat and reuse wastewater for green spaces. In industry and agriculture, we can treat and recycle discharge for things like cooling systems and irrigation.
By exploiting this valuable resource, we will make the water cycle work better for every living thing. And we will help achieve the Sustainable Development Goal 6 target to halve the proportion of untreated wastewater and increase water recycling and safe reuse.
Download this Factsheet and learn more.
How Do You Participate?
You can participate either to spread the awareness or to learn more about what you need to do reduce water wastage. This is possible via attending the upcoming events in locations closer to you. See the events map to participate. Also, you can get inspired with stories about wastewater and shareable resources you can use.
