Large numbers of people show their opposition against the Polavaram Dam.

 

   The dam and river inter-linking project, called Polavaram project, straddles the eastern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh (AP). The AP government is promoting the project over objections from its neighbours Orissa and Chhattisgarh states that decry the project's adverse impact on local communities.

Despite large investments in water and sanitation in the 1980s and 1990s, the number of people without access to basic water and sanitation services in urban and peri-urban areas continues to increase.

Reforming water utilities and attracting private investment is difficult. Politically sensitive tariffs, limited scope for competition, slow asset turnover requiring long-term debt finance, and a daunting mix of currency, information, country and sub-sovereign risks all require careful handling if private participation is to succeed. These problems explain why foreign direct investment in water lags as much as ten years behind that of power or telecommunications systems.

PENANG (IPS) - Plans to privatise three major rivers in densely populated Selangor state, in May, have sparked an outcry among concerned groups, alarmed at common natural resources falling into private hands. 

   Under 30-year concessions, three firms will manage a river each and ensure cleanliness. They will be required to repair riverbanks damaged by sand excavation and deepen the rivers to prevent overflowing and flooding. 

State policies in the context of the state/ national/ and international development goals.

In particular reference to water, however, the draft state water policies (1995 and 2005) continue to alienate communities’ traditional rights on water use and management including the traditional wisdom and knowledge. Rajasthan Government needs to spare a thought about UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to which Govt. of India is committed to attain by 2105. In the context of the MDGs, goal no 7 “ Ensure environmental sustainability” aiming at integrating the principles of sustainable development, reducing by half the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and achieving significant improvement in lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers by 2020 remains a far cry. India is not on track achieving the MDGs by 2015 including the goal 7. Moreover, State Development Goals or 6 priorities as envisioned in Vision document of the Rajasthan Government (as given below) do not explicitly make a mention or seek to address the UN MDGs, in particular, goal 7 related to water.

This large dugout is being used to hold greasy leftovers from the Pakistan Railways Diesel Locomotive Workshop.

 

   The roughly 200 families living there travel to other locations in the city to fetch clean water because the supply in the entire community is contaminated by oil residue dumped by the Pakistan Railways Diesel Locomotive Workshop.

   The greasy leftovers – diesel and lubricants – extracted from ageing engines brought in for repairs and overhauls are held in a large dugout in the ground before it is pumped out, packed in drums and sent for auction. The time the waste remains in the dugout is what causes the contamination.

Desalination or desalinization refers to any of the several procedures that remove the excess salt and other minerals from water in order to obtain fresh water suitable for animal consumption or irrigation, and if almost all of the salt is removed, for human consumption, sometimes producing table salt as a by-product.

Desalination of brackish water is already commonplace in the U.S., where it is used to meet treaty obligations for river water entering Mexico. Desalination has spread into use over a hundred countries, with Saudi Arabia accounting for about 24 percent of total world capacity. Kuwait built the world's first large-scale desalination plant in the 1960s. Kuwait's energy reserves are so great that Kuwait is unique in using desalination for agriculture. The world's largest (reverse osmosis) desalination is in Ashkelon, Israel. It began operating on August 4, 2005, and it is capable of producing 100 million cubic meters of water per year.

BANGKOK (Asia Water Wire) – Apichart Anukularmphai would rather give  the title "the world's rice exporter champion" to Vietnam than to his  own country Thailand. This, he says, is because Thailand is actually  giving away its water for free every time it sells its rice.

   "Just to produce 10 tonnes of rice, Thai farmers would need 3,000  cubic metres of water," explained the chairman of the Southeast Asia Technical  Committee of the Global Water Partnership, which groups together multilateral and government agencies, companies, institutions working on water management around the world. "This cost is not  being taken into consideration when we export our rice."

The twin issues of rural water supply and sanitation and gender are closely interlinked. Women are the primary collectors, transporters, users and managers of water in rural areas and are responsible for family nutrition, hygiene, health and community activities. In some water-scrace countries in Asia, when a woman turns 65, she will have spent one-third of her life getting water.

 Source: the ADB's Regional Journalist Workshop on Water Issues in Asia

TOKYO, (IPS) - Japan, a voracious consumer of marine resources, is now discovering that the drastic depletion of its own fish stocks is linked to the loss of underwater seaweed colonies -- caused, in turn, by rising sea temperatures.

   ''It's no exaggeration to say that Japan faces a critical situation when describing the rapid decline of marine supply in its domestic waters that is linked to seaweed loss. Tengusa (seaweed) provides food for marine species,'' says Tomohiro Takase, head of the fisheries department at the Hachijojima municipality.

The tank in village Shahpur is located in an area that was evidently important for the Chandela kings. Steeped in history the area has temples, elephant stables and was clearly a resort for the royalty.

JATARA, India (Asia Water Wire) - The drive to Jatara in Madhya  Pradesh, one of the most backward states in central India, is a long  one.

   It takes you from the state capital Bhopal to Jhansi and then  through a two-hour long ride to Tikamgarh. The historical  significance of the region grows with the ride, and upon arrival at  the destination, you know that everything you are about to see is  steeped in the magnificent history of the area.

The tank in village Shahpur is located in an area that was evidently important for the Chandela kings. Steeped in history the area has temples, elephant stables and was clearly a resort for the royalty.

JATARA, India (Asia Water Wire) - Wisdom of the ancients could soon  benefit modern-day farmers and fisherfolk in one of India's poor  regions, thanks to the innovative rehabilitation of unique water  tanks built more than a millennium ago in central Madhya Pradesh state.

   These Chandeli tanks, as they are called locally, were built by  kings and feudal landlords more than a thousand years ago. They  served as the epitome of sound water management practised in earlier  times.

SURABAYA, Indonesia (Asia Water Wire) - Indonesians used to welcome rains as a sign of better, more fertile times, but are increasingly greeting them with dread due to the increasing severity of floods.

   Across different parts of this archipelagic country that has been bathed in rains since the start of the year, many are bracing for even more problems that floods may bring this month.